


After You

by Chrmdpoet



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Child Abuse, Childhood Friends, Childhood Trauma, Childhood to Adulthood, Comfort/Angst, Consensual Underage Sex, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Enemies to Friends, Eventual Romance, F/F, F/M, Falling In Love, Friends to Enemies, Friends to Lovers, Growing Up Together, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Physical Abuse, Teen Angst, Therapy, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2017-08-22
Packaged: 2018-07-23 22:39:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 27,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7482675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chrmdpoet/pseuds/Chrmdpoet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They grew up together in pieces, scattered here and there, like an unfinished puzzle. In moments, sometimes tender and sometimes turbulent. In both careful and careless connection.</p><p>They collided as two roads converging, two paths always intended to meet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a work I've had sitting in my files for a while. I have tended to it here and there, always keeping it close to my heart, and I finally decided to go ahead and start posting it.
> 
> I wrote this first chapter to a soundtrack of "Sweetheart" by Jont. Give it a shot.
> 
> I hope you all enjoy! XO-Chrmdpoet

_i. destiny is an ache between the ribs_

Clarke had known it the moment she first saw the girl with the sea-foam green eyes and the pile of tangled chestnut curls too big for her body. The girl with the small hands clenched into fists and the small knees dusted with scabs. The girl with the gray rings under her eyes and the hollow spots under her cheekbones. The girl whose clenched jaw and busted lip cracked open Clarke’s entire world.

She was six years old that day, the day she met Lexa Woods.

She would never forget the tug she felt inside at the sight of the girl, like a physical ache between her ribs. Rubbing her small fingers over the space above her heart, she had tried to swallow down the sudden thickness in her throat. She hadn’t understood the feeling, the way it seemed to fill up all the space inside her until she couldn’t breathe. Her chest had felt tight, and her eyes stung; her bottom lip trembled, and Clarke had wanted to cry like she had never cried before, not even when the washing machine tore off one of her stuffed octopus, Leggy Sue’s, legs.

That was also the day Clarke learned that there were two types of sadness—the kind that bites and the kind that devours.

And Lexa’s sadness?

It swallowed Clarke up in a violent tide that never seemed to stop screaming, even years later.

* * *

Clarke introduced herself with unbidden tears in her eyes and an approach much shyer than any she had ever made before. Her stomach twisted and tangled in knots, and Clarke kept her hands pressed over it to try to soothe an ache that wouldn’t be soothed.

“Hi,” she murmured, a choked mess of a word.

A messy nest of curls fell over a knobby shoulder as the new girl turned toward Clarke and tilted her head.

“I’m Clarke.”

“You’re crying,” the girl said, and she reached out and pressed the tip of her index finger to Clarke’s cheek without hesitation. She hadn’t yet mastered the ‘r’ sound, so it came out more ‘cwying’ than ‘crying’, but Clarke thought her voice was pretty—soft like a lullaby after a nightmare.

One small wet finger was pressed in front of Clarke’s face as if the girl was presenting proof. She then wiped it away on her baggy denim shorts.

Clarke only nodded and whispered, “Yeah.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” Clarke’s voice cracked again around a tiny sob as she stared at the other girl’s gaunt, slightly bruised face. She _didn’t_ know. She didn’t understand why she suddenly hurt so much when she had woken up happy and bounded to school with a smile on her face. She didn’t understand why the sight of this girl made her chest hurt, why she suddenly felt like she would never be happy again.

“You’re hurt,” Clarke whispered, and she reached out just as the other girl had, reached to brush her fingers over a slightly swollen lip. The sudden movement, though, was halted by a flinch. Green eyes blinked down hard, and the girl’s body jerked away from Clarke’s outstretched hand before Clarke could ever even touch her.

Clarke snapped her hand back as if she had been burned. Knotting her fingers together in front of her belly, she chewed on her bottom lip. Her stomach clenched and stirred with the guilty feeling she always got when she accidentally broke something she wasn’t supposed to touch, except this time, Clarke hadn’t broken anything. She didn’t know _what_ she had done wrong.

Shaking her head, curls bouncing wildly, the new girl let out a hard huff and said, “No I’m not,” before plopping down into her seat and pretending like Clarke didn’t exist at all.

Clarke stared at her for a while, torn. Part of her wanted to point at the bruises again and say, ‘Yes you are,’ and another part of her wanted to pull the girl into a tight hug, the kind Clarke’s mother gave when Clarke skinned her knees or bumped her head. Clarke didn’t do either, though. She didn’t do anything, and after a moment of trying unsuccessfully to make her mouth work, she just turned around and walked away.

She didn’t even get the girl’s name.

* * *

“Slow down, honey.”

Clarke tugged on her mother’s hand, pulling her toward the school building. “Come _on_ ,” she grunted as she pulled. “She’s inside.”

“Okay, Clarke. We’ll get there. Be patient.”

“She _needs_ you.”

Abby sighed and picked up her pace, letting Clarke tug her faster into the building and down the hall, and when they rounded the corner into a small classroom, Clarke immediately shot to the back of the room.

The scrawny girl with the big hair had her back turned to them, and Clarke used her free hand to reach out and tap her on the shoulder. The girl jumped at the touch and turned swiftly around. She took a few steps back as her gaze darted from Clarke to Clarke’s mother and then back to Clarke.

“Member me?” Clarke asked even though she had only just introduced herself the day before.

The girl nodded and murmured, “Clarke,” though with her speech impediment, it sounded more like ‘Clawke’. Clarke didn’t mind. She smiled brightly and nodded, thinking the lullaby lilt of ‘Clawke’ sounded just as pretty as ‘Clarke’ did anyway.

“Yeah.” She tugged on her mother’s hand. “This is my momma. She’s a peda, um, a peda ….”

Chuckling, Abby said, “A pediatrician.”

“Yeah, that! That’s a doctor!”

Clarke watched as the girl shrunk even further back at those words, keeping her eyes carefully glued to Clarke’s mother, who smiled softly and knelt to be eye-level with her.

“I’m Abby. What’s your name?”

A beat of silence passed as green eyes narrowed. The girl shifted back and forth from foot to foot like she was on the verge of having an accident, but then she quietly muttered, “Lexa.”

Clarke felt her heart kick up in her chest at finally learning the girl’s name. She repeated it in her head over and over. _Lexa. Lexa. Lexa. Lexa. Lexa._

“Lexa,” Abby said, wearing the same tender smile. “That’s a beautiful name.”

Lexa’s busted lips pulled up with the slightest hint of a smile but then she winced as if it hurt, and they fell back into a flat line.

“Hey, I like it too,” Clarke said quickly, but Lexa didn’t smile for her. Lexa didn’t smile again, and Clarke felt squeezed and breathless in the worst kind of way.

Abby patted Clarke’s back gently before turning back to Lexa. “It looks like you hurt your lip, Lexa. Can I ask you how that happened?”

Lexa tucked her bottom lip under her top teeth but then winced again and let it free. She looked at the floor when she said, “I fell.”

“Ouch. That must have hurt,” Abby said, and Lexa nodded. “Did anything else happen?”

“Dr. Griffin! I didn’t know you would be stopping in today!”

Abby stood as Clarke’s teacher approached them with a wide smile on her face, and Clarke watched as her mother greeted the woman before pulling her off to the side. She saw Abby motion toward Lexa and heard something about ‘parents’ and ‘bruises’ and ‘services’, but she didn’t pay them much mind, because Lexa was still there, still shuffling from foot to foot and looking like the stray cat that stalked the neighborhood around Clarke’s house. Always a breath away from bolting, and no matter how softly Clarke cooed, it never let her close enough to pet.

“My momma can help,” Clarke said, sure of it. “She’s got all kinds of oinkments and medicines.” She reached out again to take Lexa’s hand, but Lexa pulled hers away at the last second.

When Clarke frowned at the rejection, Lexa whispered, “I don’t like that.”

“Holding hands?” Clarke asked her, and Lexa shook her head.

“Touching,” she said, “when I’m not weady.”

Clarke stared at her for a long moment, not quite understanding, but then simply nodded, her white blonde hair falling down in her eyes. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

Pushing her hair out of her face, Clarke blew out a loud breath. “Can I be by you if I don’t touch?”

Lexa didn’t say yes, but she didn’t say no either, and so Clarke planted herself firmly in place beside her and waited for her mother to finish with the teacher. She smiled to herself when Lexa stepped a little closer after a moment and their arms lightly brushed together.

* * *

“Wanna have a sleepover?” Clarke whispered from her blue mat on the classroom floor. She lay on her side, staring over at the red mat beside her where Lexa lay on her back, fidgeting.

She had known Lexa for exactly three days, and Clarke was certain that she and Lexa were absolutely, positively _meant to be_. She was also certain that three days with Lexa was absolutely, positively _not enough_ and neither were whispered stories at nap time or popsicle stick wars during craft time.

Lexa didn’t talk much, and Clarke didn’t know why but she didn’t mind. She talked enough for the both of them, and sometimes, Clarke thought Lexa seemed to say a lot without ever opening her mouth at all.

“Why?”

“‘Cause we’re friends and friends have sleepovers.”

Lexa rolled over then and looked at Clarke. Her eyes were so big and so green, so full and empty at the same time, that Clarke felt her stomach flip. Her chest stirred with that same feeling she had the first time she saw the other girl. “They do?”

Reaching out, Clarke rested her hand on the floor between their mats, palm up. She didn’t touch Lexa or ask to hold her hand. Instead, she just let her own hand rest there and hoped Lexa would take it.

She didn’t.

Clarke curled her hand closed and pulled it back to her chest, trying not to feel hurt by the rejection. She nodded nonetheless and whispered, “Yeah, and we’re _best_ friends.”

“Best fwiends.” Lexa repeated the words quietly like she was mulling them over, and Clarke stared at her, waiting.

She was so full with hope, so desperate for Lexa to agree, that she felt swollen and almost sick to her stomach with the want of it.

After a moment, Lexa nodded and said, “Okay, Clawke.”

Clarke’s answering smile took up her entire face, she knew. She could feel the stretch of it, but she couldn’t help herself. She nodded, face swishing against her mat and great winged things swooping around inside her chest. “Okay.”

* * *

“Lexa’s coming tonight!”

Abby smacked Jake’s chest at his goofy impression of Clarke. “Don’t tease her,” she said, letting out a quiet laugh. “She’s excited.”

“Yeah, I’m ‘cited, Dad!” Clarke stuck her tongue out at her father as she sat at the kitchen bar and colored a picture for Lexa. “Lexa’s my best friend.”

“She’s in love,” Jake murmured, elbowing his wife, and Abby snorted.

“She’s six.”

“I was seven the first time I saw you, and I was totally in love,” he argued, and Abby rolled her eyes as she licked a bit of brownie batter off her finger.

“You stuck gum in my hair on the playground.”

“Ew, Dad,” Clarke said, wrinkling her nose.

Jake’s grin widened. “My _favorite_ gum. The striped kind with the lick-on tattoos.”

“My mother had to cut my hair.”

“The bowl cut she gave you was beautiful.”

Abby rolled her eyes again and began pouring the brownie batter into a baking pan. “Clarke, did you clean your room like I asked?”

“Yes.”

“Did you put your things away?”

Clarke ducked her head and scribbled with her purple crayon. “Yes,” she said, quieter.

“In their proper places? Or did you stuff everything under the bed and in the closet?” Abby pinned her with a hard stare, and Clarke huffed out a breath before sliding off her stool and slinking down the hallway.

She was only halfway down when the doorbell rang.

Whooping, Clarke turned back and sprinted across the house as fast as her little legs would carry her. She used her whole body to pull open the heavy front door, a wide smile stretching her lips. It fell, though, when her gaze shot instantly from Lexa, standing in the doorway with a small green backpack tucked to her chest, to the man standing behind her.

He was tall, startlingly tall, with thinning chestnut hair and the same light green eyes as Lexa. His hands were resting on Lexa’s shoulders in a way that made Clarke’s belly squirm. She didn’t like it. Something about him, about the way he leaned over Lexa to look at Clarke, about the sharpness of his smile, made her uncomfortable.

“Hello there,” the man said, and Clarke chewed on her bottom lip. “You must be Clarke.”

Clarke nodded her head as she shrunk back, bumping into her father’s legs. She hadn’t even realized he was behind her, but she quickly tucked herself against his knees and stared up at the man in the doorway.

“Titus Woods,” the man said, releasing Lexa’s shoulders to shake Jake’s hand.

As the two men introduced themselves, Clarke’s eyes slipped down to Lexa’s face. Their gazes locked, and a small, shy smile touched Lexa’s lips. Clarke’s heart kicked up hard in her chest and she squirmed in place. She held out her hand but Lexa only rocked on her heels and clutched her bag more tightly to her chest.

“Momma’s making brownies,” Clarke said, pulling her rejected hand back and wiping her sweaty palm on her shirt.

“Okay.”

“You coming in?” Clarke asked, and Lexa nodded. She started to step forward, but then her father’s hands came down on her shoulders again.

Clarke felt a flash of confusion, white-hot like she was actually more angry than confused, rip through her when Lexa winced hard at the touch.

“Whoa there, Lex,” Titus said with a laugh. “Aren’t you going to give your daddy a hug?”

Another wince marred Lexa’s features, but then she quickly turned and wrapped her arms around her father’s leg. He squatted and wrapped his arms around her. Her bag pressed between their chests as he rubbed a small, gentle circle over her back. “You be good, okay?”

Lexa nodded, and Clarke had to stop herself from pulling the girl into the house the second her father released her.

With an easy laugh, Mr. Woods shook Jake’s hand again. “Careful with this one. She’s clumsy as can be, always bruising herself up.”

“We’ll keep an eye on her,” Jake said, and Lexa twisted her hands together on top of her bag.

She stared at the floor like she wanted to drop down into it and disappear, and Clarke got angrier with every downward dip of Lexa’s lips. By the time Lexa’s father left, she felt like a tiny bomb on the verge of exploding.

It took three brownies, a glass of milk, and the first genuine laugh of Lexa’s that Clarke had ever heard for the feeling to go away.

* * *

Clarke had been confused when Lexa insisted on changing in the bathroom where no one could see her, because Clarke had stripped out of her clothes and into her monkey pajamas in about ten seconds flat and hadn’t given a single thought to being naked (but for her striped panties) in front of Lexa. Her mother had explained that some people didn’t like to undress in front of others, though, so Clarke was doing her best to be patient.

She stood just outside the bathroom door, rocking on her heels. Leggy Sue, in all her purple and patched glory, was tucked under one arm and her stuffed lion, Dave, was smashed under the other. His wild golden brown mane reminded her of Lexa’s bushy hair, and Clarke hoped Lexa would like him.

Huffing, Clarke pressed her face to the door. She was certain Lexa had gone in there fifty _million_ hours ago and was starting to worry that the other girl had been swallowed up by the toilet or something. “Lexa,” she muttered, the name smooshed by the press of her lips to the door. “Lexa. Lexa. Lexa.”

The door opened so suddenly that Clarke fell forward, smacking hard into Lexa. They stumbled, stepping on each other’s feet, and then tumbled down to the tiled bathroom floor. Lexa’s bottom hit the floor a second before Clarke landed clumsily in her lap. Their foreheads knocked together, and Clarke groaned.

“Ouch.” She didn’t move off of Lexa but simply leaned back, rubbing her forehead. “Sorry.”

Lexa’s face scrunched like she was uncomfortable but she didn’t tell Clarke to move or try to squirm out from under her. Instead, her frowning lips turned upward after a moment. Her cheeks puffed outward, and then she let out the tiniest breathless giggle.

It vibrated against Clarke’s belly, and Clarke felt her face flush with a pleasant warmth. She grinned, unbridled, and let out her own little laugh. “I thought you were never coming out _ever_ ,” she squealed, pushing Lexa gently down and pinning her. Leaning down without thought, she pressed their bellies together and playfully bopped her nose against Lexa’s. “I got Dave for you.”

Lexa’s brow furrowed, her two eyes beginning to blend into one giant green-ringed pupil in Clarke’s vision as their faces pressed together. “Who’s Dave?”

Wiggling on top of her, Clarke shifted enough to pull Dave out from between their chests. She bopped the stuffed lion’s nose against Lexa’s cheek and made a loud kissing sound. She followed it up with a kiss of her own, smacking her lips against Lexa’s other cheek, just as loudly.

Lexa’s eyes widened a moment but then she let out another small laugh.

“This is Leggy Sue,” Clarke said, rolling off of Lexa and holding the stuffed octopus up over their heads. “She’s from the ocean and eats seaweeds. She’s my best friend.”

When a frown tugged at the corners of Lexa’s mouth, Clarke quickly shifted closer and whispered, “After you, ‘course.”

Bruised lips turned up the slightest bit. “Okay, Clawke.”

* * *

“Who’s ready to go to space?”

Next to Lexa, Clarke bounced on top of her bed and raised her hand. Her father moved into the room with her mother right behind him. Abby stood in the open doorframe, smiling and watching as Jake placed his hands under Clarke’s arms and pretended he was speaking into a mouthpiece.

“Checks completed. Houston, we are ready for lift off.”

Clarke wiggled in her father’s hold and started counting aloud with him. “10, 9, 8 ….”

She squealed when Jake made a loud rumbling sound and picked her up off the bed. Soaring up into the air, Clarke threw her hands over her head and released a loud peal of laughter. When he placed her back down on the bed, ruffling her hair, Clarke turned to face her new best friend.

Knees pressed to her chest, Lexa hid a small smile behind the knobby hills. Her eyes were glued to Jake, and he smiled at her.

“What do you say, kiddo?” He held out his hands. “Wanna go to space with Clarke? She might need a buddy up there so she doesn’t get lonely.”

Lexa remained firmly in place at the headboard, but her face peeked up a bit more over her knees, and Clarke smiled.

“Yeah, come on, Lexa.” Clarke encouraged her. “Come to space.”

Hesitating only a moment longer, Lexa finally peeled herself away from the headboard and stood timidly up on the bed. She walked slowly toward the end and let Jake place his hands under her arms. Her face flashed with the slightest bit of excitement when he started up the rocket’s engine, a deep rumbling that started in his chest and roared up his throat and into the room.

The moment he tightened his grip around her to lift her up into the air, though, everything changed.

Lexa let out a wail that made Clarke’s heart clench hard enough to hurt. It raced between her ribs as Jake quickly set Lexa back on the bed, concern riddling his features, and cupped a hand around her cheek.

“Hey, it’s okay, kiddo.” He kept his voice soft, and Lexa’s suddenly tear-filled eyes refused to meet his gaze. “What’s wrong?”

“Lexa?” Clarke whispered the name, whispered it so softly that she wasn’t sure the sound actually left her mouth at all, and then she looked to her mother.

Abby moved into the room, pushing Jake gently aside, and bent to be eye level with Lexa. “Are you hurt, honey?” She reached out to run a hand over Lexa’s hair but pulled it back when Lexa shrunk away from her, nodding. “Okay, can you tell me where it hurts?”

When Lexa wrapped her arms around herself so that she could point to a spot just under her shoulder blade, near her side, Abby frowned.

“Can I see?”

Lexa shook her head, her gaze flitting back and forth between Clarke’s parents. “I’m not posta show.”

“You’re not, huh?” Abby glanced behind her, and Clarke was confused when her father, wearing an expression that made Clarke’s stomach hurt, suddenly nodded and left the room. The door clicked closed behind him, and Abby turned back to Lexa. “Did your mommy or daddy tell you not to show anyone?”

When Lexa chewed her bottom lip and winced, Abby gave her a tender smile. “Okay.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Well, I’ll tell you a secret. That rule doesn’t count with doctors.”

Lexa’s eyebrows lifted toward her hairline and Abby gave her a nod and another encouraging smile. “It’s okay if you want to show me.”

It seemed like an eternity passed, the silence pulsing around them like a living entity and Clarke’s belly continually twisting itself into knots, before Lexa gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod.

Abby reached out slowly, letting Lexa see her hands every inch of the way, and gently latched onto the bottom of Lexa’s green-and-blue striped nightgown. She lifted it enough to expose most of Lexa’s back, and Clarke quickly shifted on the bed to see.

It felt like her heart crawled up into her throat and stuck there when Clarke’s eyes landed on a series of dark bruises on Lexa’s otherwise porcelain back. They were large spots, wrapped partially around her ribs and stretching toward her shoulder blade, and they were distinct. Four long lines of purple marked her, like fingers spread across and pressed into her skin with enough force to leave a lasting impression. To Clarke, it almost looked as if someone had traced their hand on Lexa’s body and then colored it in with purple and black.

Clarke watched as her mother peeked around to look, holding Lexa steady, and then Abby closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose. She didn’t know what exactly was happening or what any of this meant, but Clarke knew it was bad. She could tell by the movement of her mother’s throat around a thick swallow. She could tell by the way Abby carefully rubbed Lexa’s back and patted her bottom before putting her nightgown back down, the same way she always did with Clarke when Clarke didn’t feel good. She could tell because the sight of Lexa’s back made her feel the way waking up from a nightmare felt, like she couldn’t get enough air into her lungs.

Her heartbeat throbbed so loudly in her ears that she didn’t hear Abby’s next words. She didn’t hear her mother’s questions or Lexa’s answers. She didn’t hear anything but the heavy sounds of things she didn’t understand, the heavy sounds of heavy things embedding themselves inside her whether she understood them or not.

Later that night, when they lay together in Clarke’s twin-sized bed, both awake but quiet, Clarke tucked Leggy Sue under one arm and held the hand of her other out to Lexa. It lay atop the green jungle-themed comforter on her bed, empty and open. Holding her breath, Clarke waited. Her cheeks were tracked with tears in the dark, and though she expected her hand to remain empty, she couldn’t help but hold it there.

Eventually, she thought. Eventually, Lexa might need it.

She had nearly drifted off to sleep when she felt Lexa’s small fingers slide across her palm and then weave between her own. It was a jolt to Clarke’s system. She let out a soft huff of a breath and squeezed.

She squeezed for all the words she didn’t have, for all the things she didn’t understand, and for every purple strike across Lexa’s back. She squeezed for everything she felt in her tiny bones for the girl beside her and for every hug she would give if she could. She squeezed until her eyes stopped watering, until her heart stopped hurting, and she only let go when Lexa did.

* * *

When Lexa was pulled from craft time on a sunny Tuesday morning the following week, Clarke didn’t think anything of it. She didn’t think anything of it until Lexa didn’t come back.

She didn’t come back to finish her pipe-cleaner rainbow or to share Clarke’s lunch. She didn’t come back for recess or nap time or snacks. She didn’t come back the next morning or the one following that, and no amount of explanation from Clarke’s mother about foster care or child protection or ‘Lexa’s best interest’ served to ease the angry ache inside.

It started as a spark, just a flash of panic between Clarke’s ribs, and then it quickly grew. It grew and grew until it burned up Clarke’s insides and left her feeling ruined and raw. The devastation increased with every day that Clarke planted herself beside Lexa’s empty desk and empty mat and waited. She waited and waited and waited.

And Lexa never came back.

* * *

Three years later, long after she had stopped thinking and hoping and waiting, Clarke saw Lexa again.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for the kind support you've shown for this story so far. I appreciate it so much!
> 
> I wrote this chapter to a soundtrack of "Facedown" by the 1975. Give it a shot. I hope you all enjoy! XO-Chrmdpoet

_ii. caring is knowing when to zip your lips_

Mrs. Crow’s third-grade classroom was a colorful array of student drawings, laminated multiplication tables and spelling guides, and printed photos of various student events. Posters marked with cartoon apples and worms encouraged good behavior from all four walls. Student names were squeaked across giant dry-erase boards, and some were followed by check marks for bad behavior. Three check marks, and it was all over. Consider your recess forfeited.

Clarke glanced to the white board. Her name had two check marks beside it, one for throwing a marker at Jasper Jordan’s head after he stole her strawberry-scented eraser and one for talking while the teacher was talking. Clarke couldn’t help herself on the latter mark. She was too curious, too eager, and when something popped into her head, it just as quickly popped out of her mouth.

The fear of a third check mark was alive and well, bubbling just under the surface. Clarke felt queasy with the feeling, the way she always did after she chugged her dad’s Pepsi while her parents weren’t watching. She was unable to sit still, her legs kicking back and forth under her chair so that her shoes made a quiet brushing sound against the carpet. She knew a third check mark would ruin everything.

It wasn’t so much the prospect of losing recess that worried her. It was what came after. Clarke had never gotten three check marks that hadn’t then been followed by a fourth, and a fourth was definitely worse. She always ended up coming in from recess with her mood in the toilet and an attitude hot on her tongue, having spent the entire time at the wall as her punishment (completely missing out on swings and hopscotch). The combination was prime fourth-check-mark material, and a fourth check mark?

A fourth check mark meant a letter to her parents, folded up inside of a big white envelope and safety-pinned to Clarke’s shirt like a giant sign flashing ‘I’m a troublemaker’ to the world. A fourth check mark meant not only trouble at school but trouble at home, and trouble at home was the last thing Clarke wanted.

The last time she went home with a fourth-check-mark envelope pinned to her shirt, she was stripped of her Nintendo and dessert privileges for two days and got a full thirty-minute lecture on why ‘we don’t put worms on the teacher’s desk’. Her explanation that Jasper and Monty had actually dug up the worms and Clarke had only been showing them to the teacher ‘for science’ did little to save her.

She hadn’t felt so thoroughly scolded since the time she stole fishing line from her father’s tackle box, tied one end to the bathroom doorknob and the other to her loose tooth. When the door slammed shut and jerked her tooth out of her mouth, Clarke had let out a wild howl. Her mother found her on the bathroom floor, and despite Clarke’s triumphant holey grin, she hadn’t been impressed. It was the strangest thing to be scolded and hugged at the same time, but somehow, it made the scolding seem all the more serious to Clarke. Well, that and all the blood that had been staining her chin and t-shirt.

She was determined to hold steady at two check marks. Her dad was making peach cobbler for dessert, Clarke’s favorite, and she wasn’t about to miss out on that. She would be on her very best behavior no matter _what_ happened, no matter w—

A quick, sharp knock on the door pulled everyone’s attention to the right just as the principal, Ms. Peters, poked her head in. “Sorry to interrupt,” she said, “but we’ve got a new student to introduce!”

Ms. Peters then pushed the door fully open and ushered in someone Clarke couldn’t quite see from her desk. When they moved to the center of the room, though, Clarke’s entire body went rigid. Her swooshing feet stilled, her throat closed up to the point that it hurt to swallow, and her heart dropped down into her stomach so hard and so fast that she thought she might throw up.

“Everyone,” Ms. Peters said, wearing her signature toothy grin and blue cardigan, “this is Lexa Woods. She just moved back into town and will be joining your class. Can you all say ‘hello’?”

The kids around Clarke all chimed off their hellos, some shouted and some mumbled, but Clarke couldn’t speak at all. Her tongue suddenly felt too big for her mouth, and she couldn’t do anything but stare at the big bushy curls and seafoam eyes that had been seared into her memory years earlier.

Lexa looked different, different but somehow still the same. She had the same features, though no visible bruises or markings, and her face was a little more filled out than it had been when they were younger. She was taller, more legs than torso now, but still more hair than body. She was scrawny and beautiful, and Clarke felt like she couldn’t breathe while looking at her.

When the principal left the room, Mrs. Crow stood next to Lexa and placed a hand on her shoulder. Clarke wanted to scream when she saw Lexa wince at the sudden touch.

It was too familiar, too personal, too much. Clarke felt dizzy with all the things that rushed to the surface at the sight of her. She could still remember the exact way it felt to wait and wait and _wait_ , the exact way it felt to _stop_.

“Lexa, why don’t you tell the class a few things about yourself,” Mrs. Crow encouraged. “Ms. Peters said you just moved back. So, you lived here before?”

Clarke found herself nodding at the same time as Lexa, who hadn’t seemed to notice her yet. She was seated near the back in the third row, not the easiest to see from the front of the room. Part of her _wanted_ Lexa to see her but another part of her wanted to sink down into her chair and disappear.

“And how old are you?”

Lexa stood stiff as a board beside the teacher, sucking on her bottom lip and staring blankly ahead. “Ten.”

“Ten years old,” Mrs. Crow said with a smile and a pat to Lexa’s shoulder. She then looked to the class. “We have some double-digit birthdays coming up in here too, don’t we?”

Several kids nodded, a few mumbled, and Clarke just continued to stare. Half-tucked under her desk and half-straining to see and to be seen. She felt at once flushed with excitement and overwhelmed with the urge to cry, and her heart felt like it was beating too fast in her chest. She had been truly convinced that she would never see Lexa Woods again. She had _grieved_ over her and _for_ her, and now here she was. Lexa. _Her_ Lexa.

It was _too_ _much_.

“All right, Lexa,” Mrs. Crow said. “How about you tell us your favorite color and then we’ll get you set up with a desk and a cubby.”

Fingers playing with the bottom of her yellow t-shirt, Lexa glanced up at the teacher and then back toward the class. For a moment she looked as if she wasn’t going to answer, but then she released her bottom lip with a smacking pop and said, “Gween.”

Her speech impediment wasn’t as pronounced as it once had been but it was still clearly audible. The familiarity of it and of Lexa’s lullaby voice tugged Clarke’s lips up with the beginnings of a smile. It fell quickly, though, when a loud laugh rang out from Clarke’s left. She suddenly found her courage again when Jasper pointed to the front of the room and said, “She talks funny!”

Clarke was on her feet before she could stop herself. “No she doesn’t,” she snapped, anger flashing through her chest, and without thinking, she pushed Jasper right out of his seat and onto the carpeted floor.

Heat rushed to Clarke’s cheeks as she balled her hands into fists at her sides and glared down at Jasper.

“ _Clarke!_ ”

Whirling around, Clarke only briefly registered Mrs. Crow’s hands, propped on her hips, and the stern expression on her somewhat wrinkled face. Her gaze dropped too quickly to the girl standing beside her, to Lexa’s wide eyes and slightly gaping mouth. Her heart jumped into her throat and stuck there painfully the second time her name was uttered.

“Clawke.”

She nodded, pressing her hands over her rolling stomach, and let her feet carry her a few steps forward without thought. She stopped before she could get too close to Lexa, stopped and rocked on her heels. “Hi,” she muttered, and the word barely crossed her lips, barely survived past the stuttered breath it slipped free on. It had hardly any voice at all.

Taking a deep breath, Clarke started to say more. She started to tell Lexa that she had waited for her, waited so long that she sometimes felt older than she was. It didn’t make sense to most people, Clarke knew, but it made perfect sense to her. She felt like she had a lot more than nine years in her heart, though she could never find the right words to explain the feeling. Some part of her just _knew_ , though, that Lexa would understand.

She started to say that waiting wasn’t even the worst part, that it was the wondering that had made Clarke feel pulled and picked apart inside. Wondering where Lexa was, if she was okay, if she was safe, if she had a stuffed animal to sleep with, if she was happy … if she was covered in marks like the ones Clarke still sometimes saw when she closed her eyes. Wondering if she would ever see Lexa again.

But as soon as she opened her mouth, the wind was knocked clean out of her.

Her vision was obscured by a mess of curls as Lexa barreled into her, pulling her close and squeezing Clarke like maybe she had waited too. Like maybe she had grieved. Maybe she had wondered.

Clarke gasped and giggled and wrapped her arms as tightly around Lexa as she could, and in that one embrace, she felt some piece inside herself, something that had broken off, gone missing, fall back into place.

And not even the third check mark squeaked onto the board beside her name could take that away from her.

* * *

The scratchy surface of the brick rubbed against Clarke’s forehead as she stood against the wall and did her best to get a look around the playground without getting herself into more trouble. Jasper stood a few feet to her right, whispering jokes and a half-hearted apology (in the form of a whiney ‘ _come ooon, Clarke’_ ) at her from his place on the wall, but Clarke tuned him out. He was always getting himself and everyone else into trouble, and Clarke was still mad at him for making fun of Lexa. So, as far as she was concerned, he wasn’t there at all.

If she turned a bit, just enough that her right temple was pressed to the wall instead of her forehead, Clarke could see Lexa.

She wasn’t with anyone, wasn’t swinging or playing basketball or making friends with the other kids. Instead, she sat by herself on the sidewalk bordering the playground with her elbows on her knees and her chin propped up in her hands. Just watching everyone.

She shouldn’t be alone, Clarke thought. Not now. She just got back, and everything and everyone had to feel at least a _little_ strange, a little uncomfortable. Clarke didn’t want her to be alone.

“How come you know that girl?” Jasper asked, his heavy whisper buzzing at Clarke’s ear like an insect that she wanted to squash against the wall.

He didn’t remember Lexa from her brief time with their class. He didn’t remember her, and from what Clarke could tell, hardly any of the other kids remembered her either.

But Clarke did.

The short time she had had with Lexa had left a lasting impression, and for a long time after, Lexa was the only thing she thought about.

There was so much she wanted to ask her, so much she wanted to tell her about all the things Lexa had missed in Clarke’s life. There was so much Clarke needed to know and needed to share. She was so full with it all that she could burst, and she didn’t want to wait. She was done waiting.

“She’s my best friend,” Clarke said, more to herself than to Jasper, and rather than stick around to hear any kind of response, Clarke did something reckless.

She left the wall.

Mrs. Johnson, one of the second-grade teachers who was on recess duty that day, blew a whistle and called her name, but Clarke just kept walking. She walked until she had crossed the entire playground and plopped down next to Lexa on the sidewalk.

“Clawke.” Lexa looked over at her, eyes wide, and Clarke somehow felt both sad and happy at the same time. “You can’t leave the wall.”

Cupping her hands over her knees, Clarke scooted a bit closer and said, “Where’d you go?”

Lexa didn’t say anything, and her gaze dropped from Clarke’s face to the ground. She shrugged a shoulder, and Clarke resisted the urge to wrap an arm around her. Reaching down, Lexa drew a circle in the dirt between her feet, and then finally answered. “My uncle’s house.”

“You’ve got an uncle?”

Lexa nodded. “I didn't meet him until I moved in with him. He lives in a big city.”

Slowly, Clarke scooted closer. Their shoulders rubbed together, and Clarke whispered, “I missed you.”

“Clarke!”

Groaning, Clarke pushed onto her feet and trudged toward Mrs. Johnson, who had finally made her way over. She had one hand propped on her hip and the other was waving Clarke toward her. When Clarke glanced over her shoulder, she gave Lexa a sheepish smile and tried to ignore the wiggling weight of worry sloshing heavily around in her stomach.

It was going to be a long day.

* * *

The large white envelope pinned to Clarke’s shirt crinkled a bit as she climbed into the backseat of her father’s car and huffed out a heavy breath.

“I can explain,” she said before the door was even fully closed.

Jake attempted to look stern for a moment only before he let out a soft laugh. “I don’t think ‘for science’ is going to work any better this time than it did last time, kiddo.”

Crossing her arms over her chest, Clarke crinkled the envelope further, and Jake shook his head.

“Bending the letter out of shape won’t work either.” He reached back and patted Clarke’s knee. “Your mom will still be able to read it.”

“I know,” Clarke grumbled, but she kept her arms in place all the way home.

When Abby got home from work, Clarke was seated at the kitchen island, quietly doing her homework, while Jake cooked dinner. The envelope was still pinned to her chest, much to Clarke’s annoyance, and Abby took one look at it and the smile she had come in with quickly faded.

“Another one, Clarke?” She set her bag down by the door and made her way over.

“She can explain,” Jake said, repeating Clarke’s earlier words, and Abby rolled her eyes as she reached to unpin the envelope from Clarke’s shirt.

When she cracked open the seal and began reading the letter, Clarke held her breath. She didn’t have to wait long, though, before—

“You pushed a boy to the ground!”

“I can explain!”

“Don’t even try to tell me it was ‘for science’, Clarke Griffin,” Abby warned. “I won’t have it.”

“She could have been testing gravity,” Jake tried, and Abby shot him a glare.

“No!” Clarke put her pencil down and pressed her face into her hands. “For Lexa.”

The words were muffled against her palms, distorted and unrecognizable, but Clarke’s heart beat faster all the same.

“Speak up and clearly, please.”

Groaning, Clarke put her hands down, looked up at her mother, and said, “It was for Lexa.”

“Lexa?” Abby’s brow furrowed for a moment but then recognition quickly worked its way across her features, and she deflated. Her expression crumpled and she let out a sad sort of sigh, every ounce of frustration gone from her voice. “Lexa Woods.”

Clarke nodded, and Abby pulled out a stool to sit next to her.

“Lexa’s back?” she asked, rubbing a hand over Clarke’s hair.

Clarke nodded again. “She’s ten now.”

With a small smile, Abby said, “I’m sure she is, just like you are nine now.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you want to tell me how Lexa being back led to you pushing a boy out of his seat?”

Huffing, Clarke shook her head. “No.”

“Too bad.” Abby playfully poked her side. “You’re going to have to tell me anyway.”

“ _Fine_.” Another exaggerated groan punctuated the word. “It was Jasper.”

“Jasper Jordan?” Jake’s lip curled. “That kid is a troublemaker.”

“ _Jake_.”

A small smile pulled at Clarke’s lips when her father ducked his head and laughed.

“He made fun of the way Lexa talks.”

Abby ran her hand over Clarke’s hair again. “So that’s why you pushed him out of his chair?”

Nodding, Clarke turned her attention to her homework papers. She played with the corner of one paper and kicked her legs where they dangled off her chair. “There’s nothing wrong with the way she talks.”

“I know that.” Abby squeezed Clarke’s shoulder. “And I’m very proud of you for defending someone who was being teased, but Clarke, you know violence is not the right way to do that.”

Laying her head down on the island, Clarke let out a heavy breath. “I know.” She turned toward her mother, pressing her cheek against the cool surface. “I just got so mad.”

“We’ve talked about how you can work through your anger without using your fists, honey.”

“I know.”

“So, what are you going to do tomorrow then?”

Clarke rolled her eyes and huffed but still mumbled, “Apologize.”

“That’s right.”

“No one’s gonna make Jasper apologize to Lexa.”

“Well, all you can do is be the best version of _you_ , Clarke, and be a good friend to Lexa so she knows she has someone in her corner.” Abby leaned down and pressed a kiss to Clarke’s temple. “Okay?”

“Okay.” After a moment, Clarke lifted her head up again. She played with her pencil while Abby told Jake about her day. She was only able to listen for a moment before the thought swirling around in her head jumped through her lips. “You told me Lexa had to go to a fosters house.”

“A foster family,” Abby said, turning back toward her. “That’s right.”

“But Lexa said she went to her uncle’s house,” Clarke told her, confused. “She said he lives in a big city.”

“Oh, well, that happens sometimes too, honey.” Abby took a plate of rolls Jake held out to her and crossed to set it on the dining table, talking to Clarke all the while. “When kids need to be removed from an unhealthy home, they are sometimes sent to stay with relatives.”

“Then why’s she back here?”

“Her parents are probably getting another shot at raising her,” Jake said, throwing a dish towel over his shoulder and walking over to lean against the island.

Clarke frowned. “But you said her dad was a bad guy.”

“Parents get second chances too, kiddo.”

“Even bad ones?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Abby said as she grabbed a few sets of silverware from the drawer by the stove. “That is sometimes the case.”

“What if they hurt her again?”

Making her way back around the island, Abby wrapped her arms around Clarke from behind and pressed another kiss into her hair. She released a gentle sigh when Clarke leaned back into her and breathed her in.

She smelled the same as always—like doctor’s office and fancy perfume and _mom_. It was the easiest way to describe it, Clarke thought, and those three things always came to mind.

“Well, let’s hope that doesn’t happen,” Abby said, “but if it does, there’s a possibility that Lexa might have to leave again.”

Clarke felt her heart tug hard in her chest. Pressing her hand over the space above it, she shook her head. Her hair rubbed against her mother’s shirt, making a few strands stick up with static. “I don’t want her to leave.”

“I know, Clarke.” Abby kissed the top of her head. “But you don’t want her to get hurt again either, do you?”

The thought alone made Clarke’s throat feel tight. Her eyes watered. “No.”

She pulled her mother’s arms a little more tightly around herself as Abby said, “Sometimes, what’s best for someone can be hard, but it’s important that Lexa gets the support and love she needs, right? If she can’t get that from her parents, then she needs to be with people who _can_ provide that for her.”

“ _I_ can support and love her,” Clarke said, so soft and quiet that the words came out as nothing more than a whisper.

That didn’t stop them from echoing.

* * *

When Lexa didn’t show up for class the next morning, Clarke had a full-blown internal panic. She stared at Lexa’s empty desk two rows over, and her heart beat so hard and so fast that it physically _hurt_. Doing her best to take deep breaths, she forced her eyes back on her morning math worksheet and fought to hold back tears and feelings that seemed to claw their way up from three years ago.

She held it in, every bit of it. Held it in and down and showed nothing of it but the slight tremble in her hand as she wrote, the way her throat moved around steady thick swallows. Clarke kept her head down to hide the tears building in her eyes. They were heavy and hot, hard to hold back, but Clarke did her best, because she didn’t know what else to do.

The shock of Lexa walking through the door mid-morning, though, pulled them free and falling.

Clarke wiped at her freshly wet cheeks almost angrily and blinked away the blur just to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. It was a struggle but she managed to wait another fifteen minutes for the lunch bell to ring before pushing quickly through the crowd of students making their way to the door. Her heart was still hammering in her chest when she reached Lexa, and without thought, Clarke grabbed Lexa’s arm.

The hard flinch, the way Lexa jerked and gasped at the sudden touch, made Clarke’s insides squirm. She immediately yanked her hand back and said, “Sorry. I—I’m sorry, Lexa.” She felt awful. “I just wanted to ask where you were.”

Some of the tension in Lexa’s body leaked slowly away as she seemed to take Clarke in but she still kept a bit of a distance between them. Her eyes tracked over Clarke’s face once before turning back toward the messy line of students filing out of the classroom. “I had to go to speech.”

“Speech class?”

“‘Cause of the way I talk,” Lexa said, and Clarke frowned.

“I like the way you talk.”

She also liked the way Lexa’s lips turned up at those words, just the slightest bit. Her heart calmed, its wild beat slowing and becoming more steady, and she stepped a little closer. Not close enough to be touching Lexa but close enough to be able to smell her hair when Lexa flicked it over her shoulder. It smelled like some kind of fruit. Clarke couldn’t put her finger on which one, but it reminded her of the gummies her mom always bought for after-school snacks.

Clarke blew cold air up toward her cheeks, still flushed from crying. “I was scared,” she said before glancing quickly around. She ducked her head and lowered her voice to a whisper then. “I thought you got sent away again.”

It was Lexa who closed the gap between them, stepping just close enough that their arms rubbed together. She didn’t say anything, and she didn’t have to. The heat of her arm pressed against Clarke’s was all Clarke needed.

* * *

Lexa never answered when Clarke asked her about her parents, except to tell her that she didn’t have a mom. She gave nothing more, no explanation, no anything, and Clarke got the impression that she wasn’t supposed to ask so she didn’t. She poked about other things, though—if Lexa was okay, if she was safe, if she was happy. She poked about Lexa’s uncle and learned next to nothing. Only that his name was Gustus and he had a really big beard.

When it came to how much Lexa spoke, little had changed in three years. She was still quiet, still preferred to answer Clarke in five words or less. One if she could get away with it. Though Clarke desperately wanted to know why, she never asked. She assumed the speaking thing had something to do with Lexa’s speech impediment. Maybe she was embarrassed by it, so she talked less, or maybe she just didn’t like to talk at all. Clarke figured that was probably a thing for _some_ people even if it definitely wasn’t a thing for her.

She held onto every bit of what she managed to pull from Lexa’s lips. She committed every word to memory, cherished every little sound that slipped between Lexa’s teeth. Two words in particular, though, always managed to make Clarke feel like she was floating.

“Okay, Clawke.”

Lexa said the words often, always accompanied by the tiny half-smile Clarke had come to think of as _hers_ , something Lexa saved only for Clarke. She would listen to Clarke talk about anything, about _everything_ , and every so often, her mouth would tilt up on one end and she would say it.

“Okay, Clawke.”

Like she trusted every word. Like she never doubted anything Clarke told her. Like as much as Clarke enjoyed talking to Lexa, Lexa enjoyed listening to Clarke. Like Clarke could say anything, from “Let’s play on the swings” to “Let’s run away together” and Lexa’s answer would always be the same.

“Okay, Clawke.”

It was the same smile and the same two words Clarke received when she jogged to catch up with Lexa on the way out of the school building at the end of the day.

“I wanted to walk with you to the bus,” she said as she caught up to Lexa, and Lexa’s lips quirked up at one end.

She pushed her bushy hair over her shoulder and said, “Okay, Clawke,” and Clarke grinned so wide that she felt a strain in her cheeks.

It had been two months since Lexa’s return, and Clarke had spent every possible minute she could with the girl. Those minutes were limited, though, because Lexa always seemed to have some excuse as to why she couldn’t go to Clarke’s house or have a sleepover or see Clarke outside of school. Clarke never pushed, though. She would ask but if Lexa turned her down, then that was the end of it. She had learned that, sometimes, caring for Lexa meant knowing when to zip her lips. Still, Clarke ached to know why.

She got her answer soon enough.

They were nearing the line for the number-seven bus Lexa always took when a shout rang out from their right.

“Lexa!”

Clarke turned to see a very tall, familiar man standing near an old white car. It was parked off the side of the building, a little farther from the rest of the parents there for pick-ups and from where Clarke knew her own father would be parked. Lexa’s dad was waving one of his long arms at them, and Clarke’s stomach lurched and then dropped entirely when she felt Lexa suddenly stiffen beside her.

“I gotta go,” Lexa murmured, and then she darted off without another word.

Shooting after her, Clarke caught up and said, “I’ll walk with you.”

Lexa shook her head but couldn’t seem to get any words out. Her lips were parted around shallow breaths and she walked so fast that Clarke practically had to skip to keep up. The closer they got to Lexa’s dad, the more Clarke’s insides squirmed.

He watched them every step of the way, eyes narrowed as if he was squinting to make out who Clarke was. By the time they got to him, though, Clarke could see the recognition in his eyes.

His arm shot out, hand clamping down onto one of Lexa’s shoulders the minute she was within reach. “What did I tell you about that girl?”

His low, throaty tone was in stark contrast to the one Clarke had heard three years earlier, so much so that Clarke felt chills ripple down her back. The way Titus Woods was able to keep a strangely pleasant sort of smile on his face while speaking through gritted teeth, the way he was able to grip Lexa with so much force without it actually looking like he was using force at all … it made Clarke feel sick to her stomach, and she was scared. She was scared, and she didn’t know what to do.

“Get in the car,” Mr. Woods said, jerking Lexa’s backpack out of her hands and pushing her between her shoulder blades toward the car. It didn’t look like much more than a nudge, something playful even from a distance, but Clarke heard Lexa whimper and she snapped.

“Hey!” It came out higher than expected, more squeaked than shouted, but it was all it took for a car door to open and slam shut, for Jake Griffin to make his way over. He must have been watching.

“Clarke,” he called, and Clarke felt her eyes pool with tears. When her father’s arm slipped around her shoulders, she leaned back into him and took a deep breath. Her eyes never once left Lexa, though, who was now huddled in the front seat of the old white car.

“Mr. Woods,” Jake greeted firmly, squeezing Clarke’s shoulder in an effort to comfort her. “Is there a problem here?”

Clarke watched as Lexa wiped at her cheeks in the car, watched as Lexa pressed her face into her hands and disappeared down against the seat. She then watched as Lexa’s father sneered at her own.

He kept his voice low, quiet so that only they would hear, when he said, “You keep your brat away from Lexa.”

“Listen—” Jake started, but Mr. Woods didn’t stick around to do so.

He moved to the driver’s side of the car and jerked open the door. “You and your wife do us a favor and stay the hell out of our business. You’ve done enough damage,” he said before slipping into the car and starting up the engine.

When he drove off with nothing of Lexa visible in the front seat but bits of her wild hair, Clarke felt like all the air had been sucked from her lungs and she would never breathe again.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for being patient, everyone! It's been a busy and interesting month for me. There are a few time jumps in this chapter as we begin phasing toward Clarke and Lexa's teenage years, a process which will continue into and through the next chapter (all remaining chapters, especially the final three, will be much more interaction heavy).
> 
> I wrote this chapter to a soundtrack of "Time After Time" by Cyndi Lauper featuring Sarah McLachlan (specifically that version). Give it a shot. I hope you enjoy! XO-Chrmdpoet

_iii. loss is the lingering echo of an imaginary friend_

It wasn’t a new experience, the distance. Clarke had dealt with distance before. It had lived in her blood and bones, wrapping around her insides like a fist and squeezing. At six years old, she had been breathless with the pressure. At seven, just as labored. At eight, accustomed. At nine, temporarily relieved.

But this, this was different.

This distance didn’t mark itself with miles or with a purely physical separation between two end points, two bodies. This distance was something intangible. Cloaking itself in close proximity, it existed only in the quiet and the awkward, the unspoken, the fragile, the strained. This distance marked itself with a separation between two hearts.

It planted itself inside Clarke, but it didn’t squeeze. Instead, it expanded. It rooted firmly between her ribs and began to grow like a weed.

It began the day following the scene in the school parking lot, the day Lexa’s father clashed with Clarke’s, and it grew in little breaths, little details, little moments over time. It grew in the way green eyes suddenly dropped and darted, began avoiding blue. In the way tiny steps closer slowly became tiny steps apart, became a turned head and a rigid back. In the way short sentences became single words, became nothing. It grew in the way Lexa’s quiet moments pressed together to create a persisting, impenetrable silence, that eventually left Clarke strained and spiraling and alone.

So full with this distance that she felt, always, on the verge of bursting.

The silence persisted for a year, and Clarke suffered it in secret. Lexa kept her distance even as they shared the same class, the same teacher, the same row of desks. At first, Clarke tried to understand. She tried to correct whatever she had done wrong. She tried to apologize for something, anything, _everything_. There was an invisible, intangible cord connecting the two of them, she knew, and she was desperate to take the strain off of it. Every time Lexa stepped away from her or averted her gaze, the cord tugged harder.

Lexa didn’t give an inch beyond the occasional glance in Clarke’s direction, the occasional caving of her shoulders like she was suffering the strain of the distance as well even if she would never admit it. She never acted to lessen it, though, and she never gave Clarke any explanation.

She simply withdrew, and Clarke watched it happen. Sinking back into herself after far too many failed attempts at relief, Clarke stopped trying. She let Lexa have her silence, have her distance, and she didn’t push. Eventually, she stopped trying to understand at all, and where confusion had previously been, anger took up residence.

It built in her chest, and it boiled and bubbled for days, weeks, months; like a kind of persisting heartburn. It wasn’t fair that she was being punished, and for what? She didn’t _know_. That was the worst of it. Much like when Lexa had been sent away, it was the wondering that bothered Clarke the most—wondering how they had gotten to this point and so quickly, wondering what she had done to cause it, wondering if they would ever go back to how they were before; wondering if the girl she thought was her best friend ever even cared about her at all.

Surely she didn’t or she wouldn’t have been able to toss Clarke aside so easily.

Clarke became so eaten up with her anger that she resented Lexa. She resented her for taking herself away from Clarke, for shutting Clarke out and down without even an explanation, for making Clarke feel this way. But mostly, she resented Lexa for not caring about her as much as Clarke cared about Lexa.

So, Clarke determined to stop caring about Lexa entirely. She failed, of course. She failed so completely that she, more often than not, found herself crying quietly in her bed at night—missing Lexa’s little smiles, missing the way she would say Clarke’s name, and always blaming herself. She tried not to. She tried to put the blame entirely on Lexa, but it never worked. Clarke felt guilty and angry and alone, too fried from the experience to try with anyone else. Fried, in general. It didn’t make her any less determined, however, to bury it all down and absolutely, positively _not care about Lexa Woods_.

She could do silence. If that was what Lexa wanted, Clarke could do silence just as hard, just as ugly, and Lexa would know what it felt like to be brushed off and pushed away and _broken_.

Of course, Clarke lasted only three days of pointlessly trying to give the cold shoulder to someone who had already iced over months ago, or so she thought. She lasted only three days, because on the fourth day, she saw something she wasn’t meant to see, and everything just _shattered_.

* * *

Fourth-grade physical education was mostly a lot of awkward squat thrusts, jumping jacks, and lanky kids wiggling their way up a scratchy old rope. Lexa was one of the lankiest, all long, awkward limbs and bendy beyond reason, and Clarke did her best to find it more annoying than endearing. She crossed her arms over her chest as she stood to the side of the blue mat at the base of the rope and stared up at the scrawny girl inch-worming her way to the top. She was one of the few who could make it all the way up to ring the little bell attached to the beam. When it dinged a moment later, Clarke huffed and rolled her eyes.

Coach Barnes clapped his hands and then motioned for Clarke to move forward. She was up next on the rope, which Clarke hated. The halfway mark was as far as she had ever gotten and _that_ had been a real stretch. She was not cut out for climbing; at least, not for climbing up skinny, scratchy, wiggly strings that made her feel like she was a breath away from falling every inch she managed to grunt her way up.

It was 9 AM, and Clarke was already having a crappy day.

Crappy evolved into _sweaty_ and crappy by the time P.E. was over, and from sweaty and crappy to downright horrible by the time the girls’ locker room cleared out.

They filed in together, a bunch of sweaty girls in baggy shorts and t-shirts, and began changing their clothes and using paper towels to wipe off their faces and the backs of their necks. Showers didn’t start until sixth grade, so no one ever took very long, avoiding the large open shower stall and mostly only using the big common room that contained the storage lockers and benches. A few used the toilets, of which there were only three, all walled in with doors that locked. There was also a single private shower stall, just off from the toilets, and while it didn’t have a door that locked, it did have a privacy curtain. Some of the girls preferred to change in the stalls while most of the others changed out in the main room together.

Lexa was one of the few who used a stall every time, always one of the first ones into the locker room at the end of class. That day, though, she had been held back a moment by Coach Barnes and ended up being the last one in after the bell rang. Clarke watched the way Lexa quickly grabbed her clothes and shoes from where they were stacked at the end of a bench and hurried toward the stalls, all of which Clarke knew were already full, except for the private shower stall. She heard the curtain screech as it was pulled open and then closed again, and Clarke rolled her eyes at herself.

Why she was still tuned in to every little detail of Lexa Woods, she didn’t know, but no matter how she tried, she couldn’t make it stop. It was maddening.

Clarke did her best to clear her head and focus on herself. She changed her clothes, not bothering to rush like most of the other girls did, several of them having already finished dressing and headed out to the hall to wait for a teacher to walk them back to class. Making her way over to one of the sinks, Clarke wetted a paper towel and ran it over her face and forehead. She rubbed at the sticky, sweaty spots just past her hairline and then swiped the paper towel down the length of her neck. The cool, damp press felt good. When she crossed the small room to toss her paper towel into the large trashcan, she glanced toward the stalls and stopped dead in her tracks.

The curtain of the private shower stall puffed out suddenly like something hit it from inside. One of Lexa’s elbows maybe. It was a small stall with not a lot of room to move around. The motion, though, was enough to pull the curtain a bit on the rod so that it was slightly ajar, and Clarke got a quick shot of Lexa through the gap. She didn’t mean to see anything, had only just been glancing over out of habit, her eyes always sort of roaming around any space she found herself in. She had always been observant. But she did. She _did_ see, and the lump that instantly formed in her throat told her that she would not be able to _un-_ see it.

That one flash was all she needed to realize that Lexa already _knew_ what it felt like to be broken by someone close to her, and Clarke _hated_ herself for ever having had the thought.

Her feet were moving before Clarke had a chance to think about what she was doing. There was nothing but hazy red in her vision as she grabbed onto the shower curtain a second later and wrenched it back. The guttural yelp that followed the action did nothing to clear the haze, and Clarke felt dizzy as she got a fuller, brighter view of the large yellowish-green bruise at the base of Lexa’s back and disappearing under the band of her jeans just a split second before Lexa’s arms shot across her chest and she whirled around.

“Clawke!”

Her name on Lexa’s lips sounded more like _Clarke_ than ever before, daily speech class having certainly done its job, but the ‘r’ was still soft enough that it carried the familiar melody of Lexa’s impediment. It had been months since Clarke last heard it slip over the girl’s lips, but in this moment, she couldn’t enjoy it. Lexa’s green eyes were wide and panicked, and Clarke’s chest suddenly hurt. It hurt like she had gone too long without breathing, and she felt her eyes begin to sting.

“Lexa,” she said, her voice shaky and slightly choked. “Your back.”

Time seemed to freeze for a moment as they stared at each other, Clarke breathless and Lexa beginning to tremble in place. After one hard moment of silence, Lexa’s expression contorted with frustration. “Get out,” she said in the harshest tone Clarke had ever heard from her, but Clarke stood her ground.

“Lexa, your _back_ ,” she said again, shaky but loud, and then suddenly there was a hand clamping over her mouth.

Lexa shushed her, an angry hiss as she stopped bothering to cover her flat, naked chest and used her remaining hand to jerk Clarke further into the shower stall with her. She poked her head out to peek into the locker room and then yanked the curtain closed so that she and Clarke were practically chest to chest in the small shadowy space of the stall. It was the closest they had been in months, and Clarke still felt like she couldn’t breathe.

“I fell at home,” Lexa said, lowering her voice to a whisper once they were closed in, but Clarke immediately shook her head.

“No you didn’t.” The words were mumbled against Lexa’s sweaty hand, and Lexa narrowed her eyes at Clarke before letting go.

Her words were careful, slow, measured; punctuated. “ _Yes_ I did, Clawke.”

“No you didn’t, Lexa.” Clarke huffed, tears slipping free before she could stop them. She wiped them quickly away. “Your dad did it.”

Lexa shushed her again. “ _Don’t_ talk about my dad.”

“You gotta tell someone,” Clarke said, still shaking her head. She reached up before she could stop herself and wrapped her hands around Lexa’s shoulders, surprised and temporarily relieved to find that Lexa didn’t wince or pull away. In fact, she leaned a bit into Clarke’s hold. It only made Clarke’s eyes water harder. Lexa’s skin was cold to the touch from being exposed to the air, and Clarke couldn’t help but rub her thumbs back and forth, try to create a bit of friction. “You can tell the teacher. I’ll tell my mom. We’ll tell her together.”

“ _No_ , Clawke.”

“Lexa, _please_.”

“I’m fine.”

“I know you hate me now,” Clarke said, voice cracking, “but I still care about _you_ , and I don’t wan—”

Clarke’s words stuck hard in her throat when Lexa pressed in and wrapped her arms around her. Her bare chest pressed to Clarke’s t-shirt as she squeezed Clarke tightly in the small shower stall. A stuttered sort of sob wrenched its way out of Clarke’s throat as she stood shocked and frozen for only a moment before circling her arms around Lexa’s thin body and holding on for dear life.

“I don’t hate you, Clawke,” Lexa whispered, and another, quieter sob escaped Clarke.

She didn’t believe her, but she wanted to. She desperately wanted to.

“He hurt you,” she said, her voice cracking again. Fresh tears slipped down her cheeks, hot and fast, as she squeezed Lexa, avoiding her lower back. It was somehow both the best and worst feeling in the world, Clarke thought—the best feeling to be close to Lexa again and the worst to have had it come about this way. “He’s _hurting_ you. We have to tell somebody.”

“It’s okay, Clawke,” Lexa whispered, awkwardly patting Clarke’s back in a way that made Clarke’s chest feel both shrunken and vast. “I’m okay.” She sighed when Clarke finally released the tension in her body and they sank more fully into each other. “We don’t need to tell anyone.”

Clarke held those words firm and aching between her ribs, slippery and rolling in her belly; quiet but echoing between her ears.

_We don’t need to tell anyone._

She held them as Lexa pulled back and let go, pulled on her shirt, and pulled back the curtain.

_We don’t need to tell anyone._

She held them as their teacher came looking for them, told them to hurry it along.

_We don’t need to tell anyone._

She held them just behind her teeth, an angry wave pushing against a fragile dam, through every minute of the remaining school day. Through every glance toward Lexa’s desk. Through every sad, uncomfortable bit of eye contact.

_We don’t need to tell anyone._

She held them close through the vibrating rumble of her father’s car down the road. Through the click of the front door closing behind them. Through the scraping of forks over dinner plates.

_We don’t need to tell anyone._

She held them through a warm bath and a loving “goodnight”, but when the lights went out and her bedroom door closed, Clarke felt all her strength begin to crumble.

Tears pricked in her eyes as she squeezed Leggy Sue against her chest and tried to swallow down the wash of worry and guilt sloshing around in her throat. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw a flash of Lexa’s face, a flash of Titus’s. Bruises and trembling hands and panicked green eyes. A kind of nightmare she only knew bits and pieces of, leaving her brain to fill in the gaps with all the skill of its vast imagination.

Her stomach lurched in protest to the words still pressed inside, heavy in her chest, knocking behind her teeth, and Clarke couldn’t take it. Bare feet hitting the floor with a nearly silent thud, Clarke kept her stuffed octopus tucked against her chest as she padded across her bedroom, pulled the door open, and made her way down the hall to her parents’ bedroom.

Silently slipping around to her mother’s side of the bed, Clarke shook Abby’s shoulder in the dark. As soon as Abby stirred, Clarke felt herself break. The tears burning in her eyes bubbled over and spilled free, and Clarke let out a quiet, choked cry.

Abby shot up like a rocket at the sound, jerking back the cover to get her legs free, and dropped to the floor. “Clarke,” she said, kneeling in front of her so that Clarke towered over her just a bit. She reached up and tapped the base of the lamp on her bedside table so that a dim light flickered to life just behind Clarke. “What is it, honey? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

Clarke shook her head but cried even harder when she tried to speak. Her heart felt like it was going to cave in on itself any second.

“Honey, breathe,” Abby said, pressing the back of her hand to Clarke’s forehead just as Jake began to stir.

“Abby?” He sounded groggy, not fully awake, but Abby only shushed him, so he rolled back over and went back to sleep.

Abby kept her attention on Clarke, and Clarke tried her best to do as directed. She breathed in sharply through her now running nose, a wet, painful breath that stabbed in her throat and lungs, and then blew out through her mouth.

“That’s good, Clarke.” Abby pressed her hand over Clarke’s chest and rubbed small, gentle circles there. “That’s good, baby. Take another.”

Taking another deep breath, this one less painful but still not pleasant, Clarke sagged into her mother’s hold a bit and hiccupped. “Momma,” she managed to choke out, and Abby pulled her closer.

“It’s okay,” she murmured, wrapping one arm around Clarke’s back and using her other hand to continue the soothing circles over Clarke’s chest. “You’re all right, Clarke. Keep breathing.”

When Clarke finally calmed enough, her breathing deeper and steadier, she turned and buried her face against her mother’s neck. Leggy Sue squashed between their chests.

“You want to tell me what’s wrong now?”

“I’m not supposed to tell,” Clarke said, hiccupping through the words. “I’m not supposed to.”

Abby gave her a gentle squeeze and ran her hand over Clarke’s messy hair. “Honey, if whatever it is, is making you _this_ upset, you need to tell me, okay?”

“She’s gonna hate me even more now.”

“ _Who_?” Abby patted Clarke’s back as if urging her to keep talking. “Who is, Clarke?”

“Lexa.”

“Lexa?” Abby’s brow furrowed. “Honey, why would Lexa hate you?”

Pulling out of Abby’s arms, Clarke stuffed Leggy Sue up under her chin and huffed. “Because I’m not supposed to tell anyone.”

Clarke’s belly lurched again as she watched her mother’s expression suddenly change from confused to knowing.

“Clarke, I need you to tell me if Lexa is being hurt at home again. Okay?”

Clarke rocked on her heels, digging her chin down into Leggy Sue’s bulbous head, and then huffed out another heavy breath.

“Clarke.”

She couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud, so after a moment, Clarke just nodded. It was the slightest movement, but it was all it took to cause an earthquake, shaking up both she and Lexa’s lives.

Again.

* * *

Finally coming clean to her parents about all that had been happening over the past year was a terrifying kind of relief. Talking about it, pushing all that worry and hurt and anxiety up to the surface and out, made Clarke feel too much. Too much for her to measure or put a name to. Too much for her to process at once.

They took her to see a therapist, a friend of Abby’s from college whom Clarke was somewhat familiar with. It wasn’t exactly _un_ comfortable, sitting in a big chair in a big office with her legs kicking back and forth over the carpet and her words riddled with ums and punctuated with shoulder shrugs, but it wasn’t exactly _comfortable_ either. It just _was_ , and for a while, Clarke resisted. She was quiet and withdrawn, unsure of what to say or how to say it, unsure of why she felt the way she did or what exactly it was that she was even feeling in the first place.

All she really had was the lingering squeeze of Lexa’s arms around her, Lexa’s chest pressed to hers. The lingering echo of Lexa’s words in her ears.

_We don’t need to tell anyone._

The lingering stir of guilt in her gut from telling someone anyway.

The lingering hollow spot beneath her ribs, a new and gaping hole punched through her the day Lexa didn’t show up for school. It was a heavy kind of hole, heavy with the weight of what Clarke already knew. Because this time, she hadn’t been confused by Lexa’s absence, and she wasn’t left wondering where she had gone. She didn’t sit at her desk waiting for Lexa to come back, because she knew Lexa wouldn’t.

She knew Lexa was gone, gone because of her, and Clarke didn’t quite know how to deal with that.

She learned, though. In bits and pieces, she began to open up, more and more as todays became yesterdays and yesterdays became last-months; last-months eventually turned into last-years. The moments came and went so quickly, and Clarke’s sadness and confusion slowly faded to a dull ache and understanding rather than a commanding throb. She made new friends and spent more time with those she had known since kindergarten, and it helped to have people to laugh with. It helped to laugh at all, but Clarke made sure to keep them at a comfortable distance, never letting anyone too close. Part of her was afraid to let people in, afraid someone would try to fill the space in her heart that Clarke kept reserved for only Lexa.

Solace came in activities suggested to her by her therapist, in pictures she could draw and letters she could write, in little-league sports like softball. She found release in the crack of a ball against a bat and the slide of dirt beneath her cleats, in the slap of high-fives and the cheers of teammates. It was exhausting and exhilarating.

She found focus and stability in working with her hands, little projects she could do with her parents, and when her dad asked her about building a tree house in the old oak in their back yard, Clarke found thrill again. It was hard work, but it was steady. It was consistent. It yielded real results, and Clarke was able to exchange the weight of destruction for the freedom of creativity and creation.

Still, as she drew and wrote and played, as she carefully pounded nails into boards with the miniature hammer her father got her, as she measured and built and _helped_ , she often thought of Lexa. She wondered if Lexa had found some kind of family, some kind of help, some kind of _hope_. She wondered if Lexa still thought of her, wondered if Lexa ever missed her at all.

There was a kind of guilt in getting better, lingering even after the relief took up residence in her bones; a kind of guilt that sometimes wrapped around Clarke’s heart like an angry fist and squeezed. She felt guilty for telling, for hurting, for healing. It wasn’t something she could explain, but it was there, gnawing at her insides when things got too quiet or too still.

Clarke didn’t have a clue where Lexa was in the world, but sometimes, she thought she saw her when out and about. A flash of bushy hair down the cereal aisle at the grocery store. Long, lanky limbs and an oversized t-shirt pressed between the squeaky chains of one of the old swings at the town park. A tiny, lopsided smile and green eyes amidst a blur of faces at the county fair. She thought she saw her in those little glimpses, and Clarke was never sure, never certain, but she held them firmly in mind all the same.

It took nearly another year to finish the large tree house, pressed between and held up by sturdy branches, but once it was complete, it became Clarke’s sanctuary. She hoisted up a twin-sized mattress and blankets, little tables and battery-powered lamps. She filled the built-in shelves with odds and ends—books and old toys and figurines. The walls were plastered with pictures she drew herself of people and places, black-and-white trees with rainbow apples and wild fields of wild flowers all sizes and colors and shapes. Shaky sketches of faces she knew and loved, amateur but distinguishable, and the more she drew, the better they became, the more real they appeared. One face, in particular, found its way onto page after page.

Clarke kept an old round tin hidden in the corner behind her tree-house mattress. It was filled with old letters and new ones, pages of script ranging from silly to serious, and all addressed to the one person she couldn’t share them with—Lexa. In her absence, Lexa became a silent presence in Clarke’s life, an invisible connection. A kind of imaginary friend Clarke couldn’t touch but could take comfort in.

Sometimes, at night, Clarke would sneak out of the house and into the backyard. She went to the tree house when she felt empty, when that hole she had been living with for two years couldn’t be temporarily plastered over or hidden away, when she couldn’t shake the thoughts or the worry, the wondering; when she most missed Lexa.

She would wrap herself in her blanket that now smelled like oak and read through the letters she had written Lexa since the last time she saw her. Sometimes, they were apologies, and sometimes, they were only little, strange phrases—random ways of telling Lexa that she missed her, that she still thought about her every day. Most of the time, though, they were questions. Random questions with no real purpose, just Clarke’s way of communicating with someone she thought she might never actually talk to again, someone she had spent more time away from than near but with whom she somehow felt more connected than almost anyone else in her life.

_Lexa, do you think the sun goes into the ocean when it goes down?_

_Why is fork such a weird word?_

_Do you think bark is like skin for trees and if you pinch it, it hurts? If you peel a piece of bark off a tree, do they feel it the same way we do when we peel a scab or something? I feel bad about picking bark off the trees on the playground now._

_Do you like softball, Lexa? I’m not very fast but I can hit hard. Sometimes I picture bad people when I swing. You should try. It feels good._

_Lexa, do you think echoes ever really stop or do you think they just get too quiet for us to hear them?_

_Do you like birthday cake? You’re almost twelve now. I hope you get a birthday cake._

_Do you think there are cities at the bottom of the ocean, Lexa? I wonder if they have waterproof traffic lights and seaweed blankets._

_We talked about stars in science today and a girl in my class said God made the stars. Do you think God is real?_

_Why do gnomes wear pointy hats?_

_Lexa, do you think you can miss someone so much that it really hurts? I do. That’s how I miss you sometimes._

And when she was most down, most sad, most missing a friendship that never got to flourish, Clarke would imagine Lexa writing her back. Always in one or two words, nothing more than a fleeting acknowledgment, but somehow still meaningful. Somehow still satisfying. Somehow exactly what she needed.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the extended wait on this chapter, everyone. It has been a rough and busy couple of months for me, plagued by a mountain of work and several bouts of illness, unfortunately. Thank you for your patience and for your continued support of this story, which I assure you is still very dear to me. This chapter was an emotional ride for me, and the next is one I am very much looking forward to as well, as we will finally reach the end of Clarke and Lexa's separation, and we can watch as they begin to reconnect and mend, find their balance and their way back to one another. I hope you all enjoy.
> 
> I wrote this chapter to a soundtrack of "The City Limits" by Umbrellas. Give it a shot. Take care, XO-Chrmdpoet

_iv. growing up is a shot to the gut_

They met at the start of the seventh-grade softball season. Clarke was thirteen, and while therapy had done wonders for her anger management, she was still what her dad often referred to as ‘scrappy’.

She introduced herself to Octavia Blake in a cloud of kicked-up dirt, pushing hands, and accusations.

Octavia played catcher for the opposing team, a small school two towns over with a donkey for a mascot and a softball coach whose last name was literally pronounced ‘butt-kiss’. She had come up grinning like a wolf after Clarke slid into home, cleats slamming into a padded arm as the umpire shouted Octavia’s success in protecting the plate.

And Clarke had been _livid_.

Even when they ended up shouting and pushing at one another, Octavia’s grin hardly faded, and after the game, she sauntered into the enemy’s dugout without a care. Plopping down onto the players’ bench, she used her shoulder to shove Clarke off the end and onto the ground. When Clarke jumped to her feet, steaming, Octavia just laughed and said, “I like you. Even if you _do_ suck at stealing home.”

The next year, Octavia transferred to Clarke’s school, and much to everyone’s surprise, they became inseparable.

It marked the beginning of a new chapter in Clarke’s life, a busy one, rife with activity and friendship. The last lingering bits of sorrow almost seemed to leak out from her heart, press into her edges, and disappear. She could still feel the stamp beneath her skin, the mark of things she could not change, but it was dull. It didn’t burn the way it used to.

So, she let it go. She pushed forward, and the further and faster she went, the more the past seemed lost to the cloud of dust trailing behind her.

* * *

“Why do they have to be so _big_?” Clarke huffed as she smashed her breasts down with her hands.

“You’re blessed.”

“Cursed,” Clarke countered, grabbing a sports bra from the back of her chair and squeezing into it.

For thirty long seconds, she felt like she couldn’t breathe, like someone had just wrapped her in duct tape and she could do nothing but wheeze and waddle. As always, though, the sensation passed quickly enough, and once the material stretched and loosened a bit around her body, she took a deep, comforting breath.

“Why don’t you just wear a regular bra?”

Clarke turned to the girl stretched across her bed. Long, dark hair twirled around Octavia’s slender fingers as she lay on her stomach, kicking her socked feet back and forth and staring down at her phone.

“Too much cleavage.”

“Embrace the cleavage, Clarke,” Octavia said, popping a piece of gum between her teeth. “You’re fourteen a—”

“Almost fifteen!”

Octavia rolled her eyes. “You’re _fourteen_ and already rocking a c-cup. Some of us still have boobs that are like, 97% nipple.”

“Some of us think 97% percent nipple sounds like 97% _heaven_.” Clarke flicked through the shirts hanging in her closet, wrinkling her nose at every option. Why couldn’t the right outfit just jump from the closet and shout at her? Pull a Meredith Grey, like _pick me, Clarke. Choose me._ “Big boobs are annoying.”

“Big boobs are hot.”

“I don’t want to be hot,” Clarke grumbled. “I want to be flat-chested and not have the gross guys in our class staring down my shirt all the time.”

“Welcome to womanhood,” Abby said dryly as she knocked once on the half-open door before sweeping into Clarke’s room with an armful of clean clothes from the laundry room. She dropped the pile onto Clarke’s bed, right on top of Octavia’s back. “And for the record, _all_ breasts are great, even if they _are_ 97% nipple.” She poked Octavia’s side before heading out the door again, calling over her shoulder. “Love yourselves, girls!”

“Thanks for the self-love pep talk, Mrs. G,” Octavia called back, cracking up as she rolled over and started to throw random articles of clothing across the room at Clarke. “Are you going to pick a top or are you just going to stare into your closet all night? Because we’re supposed to be there in like an hour, and Bell just texted me that he’s on the way to pick us up.”

“Stop rushing me. We can’t all be you.” Clarke bent to grab a sock from the floor and wadded it up before chucking it back at Octavia. “You just pop on one of Bellamy’s leather jackets and some old boots, and it’s instant hotness. You don’t even wash your hair half the time.”

Octavia grinned and blew a bubble before popping it and sucking it back into her mouth. “Thought you didn’t wanna be hot?”

“Oh shut up.” Clarke leapt onto the bed, laughing when Octavia grunted and tried to push her off again. Rifling through the clothes still left on the bed, Clarke finally settled on a simple white t-shirt and her favorite faded hoodie to go with her jeans. It was her dad’s and it wasn’t cute in the slightest, a worn-out jungle green that looked more olive than jungle these days, but it was baggy and comfortable and warm and Clarke was over the whole mess of trying to find something cute.

“How’s this?”

“Boring,” Octavia said, “but I _guess_ you’ve got enough personality to make up for it.”

“Why do I like you?”

“Because it’s impossible not to.”

* * *

The scent of exhaust was the first to fill her nose as Clarke shuffled along beside Octavia toward the county fair. Bellamy, Octavia’s brother, split the second they slid out of his truck. He was seven years older than Octavia and only agreed to take them to the fair because a girl he liked was supposed to be there; that, and because Octavia had apparently had him wrapped around her little finger since she exited the womb, all adorable and wailing. He slapped a few bills into Octavia’s hand, told her not to talk to strangers, and then ran off to find his would-be fling of the month.

They entered near a ride called The Predator, neon-bright and moving faster than Clarke could keep time with. The heavy beat of a song she didn’t recognize blared from the speakers at the ride’s base and people screamed and laughed from the swooping, rotating compartments. The music thumped in her ears, speckled and punctuated with the sounds of bumper cars slamming together, bells ringing out prize winners, and engines blowing steam into the night air, and Clarke’s heart fell rapidly into the rhythm of it.

The fair hadn’t changed much in the last fourteen years, but somehow, it still managed to excite Clarke. There was something thrilling about the mashed-up smells in the air, the jumbled sounds pumping around and through her, the neon lights blotting out the stars, and the swooping in her stomach; candied apples and hot cider and barbecue worth every penny of the fair’s ungodly prices. It was old news, really, a county tradition she had taken part in for as long as she could remember, but Clarke positively adored it. 

They skipped right by the ticket booth and headed straight for the back of the grounds where the food stands churned out order after order. Further out were the stables and petting zoo but neither was close enough to smell, thankfully. Octavia pulled Clarke by the arm, already listing off everything she wanted to eat, a list which basically consisted of at least one of everything available.

“Oh! And a potato pile. I know you love those.”

Clarke snorted. “Do we even have enough money for all that?”

“We’ll figure it out.”

Laughing, Clarke hurried along behind Octavia until they were just two warm bodies in an already thick crowd of people stuffing their faces.

* * *

Spotting their friends was easy enough. The ridiculous pair of goggles perched on Jasper’s head and bobbing through the crowd toward the smoked-meats stand caught Clarke’s eye almost instantly, and she pointed in his direction. As they made their way over, they could hear him bickering with Monty about which condiment was superior, ketchup or mustard.

Monty Green went to East Plains Junior High, about twenty minutes away. He and Jasper met at science camp the summer after fifth grade and had been best friends since. Jasper started bringing him around soon after, the two of them basically bouncing back and forth between each other’s houses, and Clarke didn’t mind. Incredibly smart and kinder than most boys their age, Monty was easy to love. He certainly made Jasper more tolerable.

“Shark!”

Clarke rolled her eyes at the ridiculous nickname and called back, “Casper!”

“It’s about time you got here,” Jasper said, wrapping his arm around Clarke’s shoulders. “Now, serious question. Question to end all questions. Which is better—ketchup or mustard?”

“Ketchup,” Clarke said, and Octavia nodded at her side.

Monty smiled. “See?”

Jerking his arm off of Clarke’s shoulders, Jasper shook his head and curled his lip. “You people _disgust_ me.”

“Ketchup goes with more things.” Monty blew his bangs out of his eyes and laughed. “Mustard is limited.”

“Lies!” Jasper glared. “Mustard goes with _everything_. I would even put it on pizza!”

Sticking her middle finger in her mouth, Octavia mock-gagged, and Jasper roared with laughter.

Clarke poked his shoulder. “Remember that time you ate cafeteria pizza out of the trashcan for fifty cents?”

“One of my finest moments,” Jasper said, nodding. “Remember that time you ate an earthworm on a dare?”

“Remember that time you climbed up the drain pipe on the side of the cafeteria and broke it?”

Jasper threw his arms in the air. “Broke my leg, too, but Ms. Fuller’s meltdown was totally worth it. Remember that time you filled Brian’s art box with glue because he made fun of you and it hardened so he couldn’t get his supplies out?”

“Remember that t—”

Cutting Clarke off, Octavia groaned and said, “Remember that time I _starved to death_ at the fair because you guys wouldn’t shut up and get in line?”

At her urging, they shuffled around the side of the smoked-meats stand to get in line. As they moved, Jasper put his hand beside his mouth and, as loudly as possible, whispered, “Remember that time we had a fight scene in the sixth-grade play and you accidentally punched me for real?”

Grinning, Clarke put her hand up beside her mouth as well and said, “That wasn’t an accident.”

Octavia and Monty both snickered as Jasper bumped his shoulder against Clarke’s. Pulling his goggles down over his eyes, he said, “I see your true colors, Shark Griffin, and they _hurt_ my eyes!”

“Beauty can be blinding sometimes,” Clarke said, patting his shoulder. “You’ll get used to it.”

* * *

The line for the giant turkey legs was criminal, stretching out from the booth and around it into the thick shade of the park’s many elm, maple, and dogwood trees. They were nearing the front when Octavia suddenly gasped and jerked Clarke out of the line. She yelled over her shoulder for Jasper and Monty to stay put and then dragged Clarke through heavy foot traffic to the other side of the food lane.

Before Clarke could say anything, Octavia released her to cup her hands around her mouth and shout toward one of the funnel-cake booths.

“Reyes!”

A dark-haired girl in a red bomber jacket with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows turned at the shout, pulled from conversation with the person beside her—a taller girl with dark blonde hair and a ridiculous amount of eye shadow. Her eyes searched the moving crowd, and Clarke knew they had been spotted when the girl’s lips drew into a smile.

“Little O!” She punched Octavia’s arm when they finally reached her. “You’re not so little anymore.”

“It’s only been a year, and you owe me a funnel cake for kicking my ass to the curb.”

“I didn’t kick your ass to the curb, O,” Raven said. “I kicked your brother’s ass to the curb.”

“Could have fooled me.” Octavia shook her head. “You don’t text. You don’t call. I feel so unloved.”

Rolling her eyes, Raven wrapped an arm around Octavia’s shoulders and squeezed her. “I’ve missed your manipulative ways, kid. A funnel cake it is.” She patted the top of Octavia’s head. “So grown up. So tall.”

“I literally haven’t grown a single inch since the last time you saw me.”

“You’re taller.”

“Okay, maybe I’m _slightly_ taller.”

“You’re a giant.”

“You’re dramatic.”

“I can’t believe you’re in high school.”

“I can’t believe you’re in college.”

Clarke stood awkwardly off to the side until Octavia suddenly dragged her into the small huddle.

“This is Clarke,” she said. “She puts up with me. I put up with her. I’ve heard some people call that friendship. It works for us. Clarke, this is Raven. She used to date my brother.”

“Hey.” Raven held out her hand. “How’s it going?”

“It’s good,” Clarke said, shaking her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“Yeah, you too.” Raven then motioned to the girl beside her. “This is my girlfriend, Anya.”

“Upgrade.” Octavia smiled, she and Clarke giving identical miniature waves. “Nice.”

With a small laugh, Anya asked, “Not a fan of your brother?”

“Eh, he’s my brother,” Octavia said, shrugging. “I love him, but he can be a real ass. I was always Team Reyes.”

Grinning, Raven said, “It’s the best team to be on.”

“Especially when it comes with a free funnel cake,” Clarke chimed, drawing a laugh from the other three.

Raven ushered them forward in the line, telling Octavia about her latest project at the auto-body repair shop she worked for and the classes she was taking at the community college. That was where she met Anya. Calc 1. Two rows over. One seat up.

“Looking like she was plotting murder half the time,” Raven said, and Anya rolled her eyes.

“It was a 7 AM class, which I didn’t even know existed until my adviser handed me my schedule.”

“Oh yeah.” Octavia nodded. “Everyone looks murderous at seven in the morning. Clarke actually had a full-on murder plan for her dad this summer when he woke us up at six to go to the lake. Like, she said it out loud and everything, step by step. I drew the line at feeding his body to the giant catfish at the lake, but only because catfish freak me out; plus, we didn’t have scuba suits or anything and the giant catfish are like all the way at the bottom by the dam.”

“You’re seriously _the_ worst accomplice, O,” Clarke said, shaking her head. “Besides, we took him off the hit list after he grilled those burgers for us anyway.”

“Those burgers were amazing.”

“They really w—”

Clarke choked around her words, their music dying an instant, painful death in the middle of her throat, when a fifth person suddenly joined their small group. All long, lanky limbs and familiar wild hair, the girl slipped into the slim space between Anya and Raven and thrust forward a bag of pink cotton candy and some change. She didn’t even seem to notice Clarke and Octavia.

“They didn’t have blue, so I got pink.”

That voice.

Clarke shuddered. The beat in her chest stuttered and lost its rhythm, suddenly somehow too fast and slow at the same time, and it _hurt_. The fair’s bright lights warped around her as she forgot to exhale, air trapped tightly inside and pushing at her ribs, and Anya’s voice sounded as if it was coming from a million miles away.

“That’s okay.” Anya took the cotton candy and change. She flicked her hand toward the girl at her side. “Oh, Clarke, Octavia, this is—”

“Lexa.” The name slipped through Clarke’s lips in a strained, staggered exhale, a shaky rush of breath that offered her no relief.

At the sound, Lexa’s head snapped to the side. She shifted so suddenly she nearly stumbled over her own feet, turning to face her, and Clarke watched as recognition widened familiar green eyes and slackened Lexa’s jaw.

“Wait. You two know each other?”

Clarke didn’t answer and neither did Lexa. It was as if they were frozen, unable to move; both simply trying to breathe. She didn’t even know who had asked the question, didn’t care.

Everything seemed to fade around them, the lights and bells and laughter; every image, every sound dwindled to nothing until all Clarke could hear was her own heartbeat pounding in her ears and all she could see was Lexa’s wide, stunned eyes and slightly parted lips.

She held her breath, waited for Lexa to say something, anything; waited for her to shatter the stillness with her lullaby voice.

It shattered, instead, with a small, simple shake of her head, and then Lexa turned quickly on her heel and disappeared into the crowd.

Clarke swayed in place as all her breath left her in a dizzying whoosh. Her heart dropped into her stomach and burned, and she felt her eyes begin to sting with the pain of it. Fingers wrapped around her upper arm, a squeeze she hardly felt.

“Okay, what the hell was that?” Octavia’s voice buzzed at her ear, and Clarke could feel the others’ eyes on her, but she didn’t answer.

Instead, she shook her arm free from Octavia’s grip, and before she could second-guess herself, she took off into the rolling sea of faces.

She was only interested in one.

* * *

“Wait!” Clarke bumped from body to body like a pinball as she pushed through the crowd as quickly as possible, eyes glued ahead. She caught a glimpse of Lexa’s hair, of her green-and-black plaid shirt, between the shuffling, shifting fairgoers. “Lexa, wait!”

A moment later, Lexa was gone.

Clarke slowed as she reached the end of the food stands, stared out into the dark stretch of trees and park that led to the petting zoo. Turning swiftly around, she glanced from point to point, at every stand, every green shirt, every flash of brown hair. Nothing. Her heart burned hotter in her gut, hotter and deeper until she felt sick with it.

Pressing her hand over her mouth, Clarke closed her eyes, squeezed them so tightly that it hurt. Everything suddenly felt twisted and flipped, chaotic in the worst way, and Clarke wanted to scream. A moment later, she let out a strangled yelp, eyes snapping open again, when a hand wrapped around her arm and suddenly jerked her to the side.

Stumbling over her own feet, Clarke was pulled just beyond a kettle-corn stand and into the shade of several tall trees. Once there, she felt the grip on her arm slacken and then release. Watched as Lexa stepped back to put space between them again. Clarke expected her to say something. She expected, “Stop following me” or “Leave me alone”. She expected, “Clawke.” She expected, “You told.” She expected accusations and blame and dismissal, and all the ways each and every one would hurt and hurt and _hurt_.

What she didn’t expect was for Lexa to stay with her. What she didn’t expect was for Lexa to stand, still and silent, and simply _stare_ at her. She didn’t expect to feel so on display, so squashed and flattened and pressed beneath a microscope, but she did. She felt Lexa’s eyes on her like a laser, hot and dissecting, and Clarke squirmed in the glare of fair lights spilling through the trees.

She suddenly felt intensely aware of her appearance. Her sloppy ponytail and baggy, faded hoodie made her stomach ache, and she wished she had put a little more effort into her outfit. It surprised her. Pushing the thought from her mind, she tried not to focus on herself or on the feeling of Lexa’s gaze burning over every inch of her, but on _Lexa_ instead.

She sucked in a deep, cold breath and finally took all of Lexa in.

At nearly sixteen years old, Lexa Woods was tall, so much taller than Clarke remembered, but still more hair than body. The same wild curls, pulled back in some places with thin braids, but mostly loose. The same guarded eyes. Her face was slimmer, more angular—all high cheekbones and a cutting jaw. Full lips. She looked grown, more-so than Clarke could have ever pictured in her mind, and it made her stomach stir.

Her gaze scanned down the long length of Lexa’s body. Her loose-fitting plaid shirt hung off one shoulder, put the gray tank top Lexa wore underneath on display. Her jeans were tight, stretched around fuller hips than Clarke would have imagined for Lexa, and tattered around the knees. The black converse she wore had holes in the sides, neon yellow socks visible from within, and white laces so dirty they looked gray.

Biting her bottom lip, Clarke shifted in place again and tucked her hands up into her sleeves. “Lexa.” She didn’t know what to say, if she should say anything at all, but it felt like years had already passed with them standing together between the trees, and Lexa still had yet to do anything but stare at her. It felt good to say her name, though, so Clarke let out a sigh and said it again; said it soft and full and hoped it wouldn’t be weird. “ _Lexa_.”

She tried to conjure something, anything, more, but everything felt knotted up inside her. An annoyed huff slipped out as Clarke struggled to speak, struggled to push free all the words bobbing at the back of her throat. It was as if all the years between them had compressed into a jagged lump and lodged itself in her esophagus. She felt like she would never be able to swallow it down.

But then Lexa surprised her by clearing her throat. She opened her mouth as if to speak but then closed it again, furrowed her brow. She hesitated a moment and then cleared her throat again. “Clarke.”

The sound of her name rolling off Lexa’s tongue with ease, that hard, perfect ‘r’, was unexpected. It hit her like a shot to the gut, and for just a moment, Clarke felt breathless with all the ways things change; all the ways life could sweep you up or leave you behind. Lexa wasn’t that little girl anymore, the one with the thickness in her tongue and the willingness to follow Clarke anywhere. They weren’t kids anymore. They weren’t anything.

Lexa crossed her arms over her chest, licked her lips. “Speech class,” she said, and Clarke realized her reaction must have been visible.

She forced herself to nod, to smile. It was shaky, stilted, and she had to swallow through the thickness in her throat before she could bring herself to speak. “I always liked the way you said my name before.”

Lips pursing for a moment, Lexa shifted as if uncomfortable. She straightened her spine and visibly squeezed her arms more tightly against her chest. “Things change.”

“Yeah.” Clarke nodded. “I know.” She felt hyper-aware of her body, of the space between them, of the silence and how uncomfortable it grew by the second—every breath, every lick of her lips, every bob of her throat, every squirm of her stomach—and she hated it. She was desperate to find the easy flow that once existed between them, that natural connection Clarke knew still had to exist. Somewhere down, buried deep, but there. Always there. “How—”

“Why did you follow me?”

Clarke hesitated, unsure of how to answer; unsure if she even _knew_ the answer. Standing there, across from Lexa, felt like a dream, one she knew she wouldn’t wake up from and wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to, no matter how painful it could be. She hadn’t thought of Lexa in a long time. Hadn’t pictured her face in her mind like she used to or scratched it onto paper with pencil and pen. She hadn’t found herself buried beneath a wooly blanket in her tree house, reading secret letters in the lamplight, in over a year. And now, Lexa was standing right in front of her—not a memory, not a fantasy, but a breathing, beating, _beautiful_ thing sharing the same space and air as Clarke, and looking at her as if she was foreign.

As if she wasn’t the girl Lexa once held against her naked chest, close and quiet in a cold shower stall. As if she wasn’t the girl who used to hold out her hand, wait for Lexa to touch, to hold, to connect. As if she wasn’t a part of Lexa’s history or of her heart. As if she wasn’t _Clawke_ at all.

It stung in the worst way, burning hotly in her chest. In her belly. Behind her eyes.

“I ….” She shook her head, let her body cave in a bit. Shoulders slumped. Hands loose at her sides. Somewhere along the way, Clarke had learned that honesty almost always came in one of two ways. Through the clench of teeth and fists, the fiery destruction of care. Or in the slow collapse of defense, that quiet, gentle caving. And Lexa? She deserved a tender truth, the kind that gave itself in whispers of words and touch. She had known the clench of fists too intimately, too long. “I thought I would never see you again.”

Lexa glanced away from Clarke. Her gaze disappeared into the trees, and Clarke watched as Lexa’s jaw clenched, ticked, just a second before quiet, biting words slipped through her lips. “You would have no one to blame but yourself.”

The words knocked the wind right out of Clarke, an audible rush of air slamming through and out. _Fuck_. Her eyes instantly watered, and Clarke felt her fingers curl into fists. She let her short nails dig into the skin of her palms and bit at the inside of her bottom lip to keep it from trembling.

It was what she had been expecting from the start, but Clarke quickly realized that she hadn’t been ready to actually hear the words. She hadn’t been ready to hear them once dipped in Lexa’s gentle voice and slipped between her ribs like a poison-tipped blade. Quiet truths, she realized, could still feel like destruction.

“I ….” She licked her lips, forced in a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Lexa. I couldn’t—”

“You _could_.” Lexa cut her off, eyes locking back onto Clarke. “You chose not to.”

Sighing, Clarke forced herself not to argue, and instead, she nodded. “You’re right. I chose,” she said, “but it wasn’t because I wanted you to get sent away. I wasn’t trying to betray you. I was just … Lexa, I was trying to protect you.”

A short, choppy, bitter laugh slipped free as Lexa shook her head, and Clarke hated the sound of it. It didn’t sound like Lexa at all, not the Lexa she knew or remembered or ached for. It sounded too cold, too angry; _finished_ in a way that caused a spark of panic to ignite in Clarke’s chest. Lexa hadn’t been a present part of her life in years, but the thought of losing her again in the same breath she found her made Clarke feel suddenly and unrelentingly terrified.

“I can protect myself.”

“You shouldn’t have to.”

For only a moment, Lexa closed her eyes, and Clarke watched as she took a deep, steadying breath. When she opened her eyes again, they were familiar. They looked at her like they knew her, just a flash of gentle, of care, of yesterday, and Clarke _ached_ with all the ways that one look touched her.

“Lexa.” It came out in a whisper as Clarke stepped in, stepped closer. She was reaching out, about to touch, when Lexa suddenly blinked down hard and jerked back. It was painfully reminiscent of all the times Clarke had seen Lexa flinch away from her touch or anyone else’s, and in that moment, they _were_ kids again. They _were_ , and Clarke could almost hear Lexa’s voice in her head.

 _Okay, Clawke_.

The moment slipped away as quickly as it came, though, and Clarke watched as Lexa moved away from her. “I’m walking away now, Clarke.” One step. Then two. She was flooded in light at the edge of the food stands when she glanced back one last time. “Don’t follow me.”

“Wait, no,” Clarke said, taking a step of her own. “Lexa, wait.”

By the time the words were out, Lexa was gone, disappearing into the crowd again. Clarke felt her sudden absence like a freezing wave, washing over her in a shock of pain. Seeping into her clothes, into her bones, so that she couldn’t move or breathe or even think about anything but the cold. But the pain. But the absence of warmth.

The next moment, it was almost as if it hadn’t happened at all. As if Clarke had imagined it, dreamed it. Conjured it up in a quiet moment of despair, a bubbling breath of guilt.

Lexa had come blazing back into her life like a rare comet, burning and bright and _beautiful,_ and so terribly, terribly fleeting.

And in that moment, there was no way of knowing if she had truly ever come at all.

Or if she would ever come again.

* * *

That night, for the first time in months, Clarke slept in her tree house. She dug up Leggy Sue from the old bin at the back of her closet, and when she pressed the ragged, faded stuffed octopus to her chest, Octavia didn’t say a word. The nights were getting colder, and Clarke knew it was probably past the point of sleeping outside, but Octavia didn’t seem to mind. She just squeezed onto the small mattress with Clarke and pulled the thick pile of blankets up to their chins.

Burrowing in behind Clarke, Octavia pressed her forehead to the space between Clarke’s shoulder blades. “You sure you don’t want to talk about it?”

Clutching Leggy Sue like a lifeline, Clarke shook her head. The swishing sound of her hair against the pillow sounded almost thunderous in the quiet tree house. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

“Kind of seems like there is.”

“Well, there’s not.”

“Oh, so you just came back crying for no reason then?”

Clarke huffed and clenched her eyes closed, tried to force sleep to come. She knew it wouldn’t.

“How come you never told me about Lexa?”

“What about her?”

“I don’t know.” She felt Octavia shrug, the motion causing the small mattress to dip. “Anything, I guess? I didn’t even know she existed.”

A spark of pain flashed through Clarke’s chest, and she clenched her arms more tightly around Leggy Sue. Guilt burned in her belly, boiled. Clarke was sick with the feeling. When had Lexa slipped through her fingers, slipped from her mind? When had the letters stopped? The wondering? The worry? It was a tragic, terrible thing, Clarke realized—trying to remember at what point she had forgotten, trying to understand how she had ever let herself forget at all.

Slipping one hand up from Leggy Sue’s soft, bulbous head, Clarke rubbed at the sting in her eyes. She swallowed through the itch in her throat, the thickness there that refused to thin. “It was a long time ago.”

“What was?”

“Me and Lexa,” Clarke whispered. “We were friends. We ....” Her voice cracked and she winced at the sound of it. “It’s not … there are things I can’t talk about.”

She felt Octavia shift behind her and then a hand settled between her shoulder blades and rubbed little circles there. “Why not?”

“I just can’t.” Clarke squeezed her eyes closed tighter, tighter until she felt them ache and strain. “It’s not my stuff to tell.”

Octavia was silent for a long time, and when she spoke again, Clarke expected her to push. Instead, she just continued with her small circles between Clarke’s shoulder blades, and said, “Okay.”

A shaky breath worked its way through Clarke’s lips, up from her soul, and she let the tension leak from her body. Her eyes hurt. So did her heart. But that small bit of release helped. It somehow made her feel like, at some point, this ache might actually ease again. Part of her hoped it wouldn’t.

“That’s her,” she whispered, surprising herself. Eyes still closed, she pointed to the nearest drawing tacked to the wall of the tree house just over their heads. She could picture the drawing perfectly in her mind, a younger Lexa. Head bowed. Eyes cast toward the floor. Knobby knees pressed together at her chest. It was one of several plastered around the place.

Clarke felt the mattress dip and move behind her, but Octavia didn’t say anything. She didn’t stop the motion of her hand on Clarke’s back either.

“She got sent away.” Leggy Sue muffled the words, partly tucked under Clarke’s chin and partly smashed against her mouth.

“Oh.”

Clarke opened her eyes again, stared at the barely visible tin tucked into the corner by the mattress. She wondered how many letters there would be if she had never stopped writing, wondered if that small tin would even hold them all. Her fingers ticked under the blanket, itched for a pen.

“It was my fault.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, everyone. My apologies for the extra long wait for this chapter. It's been a very busy year for me, and so I had to put my fanfiction on hiatus for a while so I could focus primarily on work and family. I hope you will forgive the interruption and carry on with this little journey with me. After fleshing out the remaining flow of the story, I realized it's going to be slightly longer than originally intended, so I've left the chapter count open-ended since I will likely be going slightly over seven chapters. We shall see how it pans out. I will try to post the next chapter sooner than a year. ;)
> 
> Anyway, I wrote this chapter to a soundtrack of "Dance Hall Days" by Imperial Mammoth (a cover). Give it a try. Enjoy! XO-Chrmdpoet

_v. history is a horror show_

Clarke got her period at fifteen. The only one in her class who hadn’t yet gotten theirs, she knew it had to be just around the corner. She’d been worried, at first, that it hadn’t come despite other signs of puberty like breast growth and pubic hair, but her mom assured her that it wasn’t a big deal. She’d been a late starter too. Still, she took Clarke in for a thorough exam and everything checked out fine. So, Clarke just went back to waiting. At least, she figured, she was prepared for the damned thing. She had heard Octavia complain about hers enough times over the summer to know what to expect, or at least, she thought she had. One look at the weird brown gunk staining her underwear, however, and Clarke was convinced she was dying.

She allowed herself a full minute of silent freaking out, sitting on the toilet at six in the morning on the first day of sophomore year with her panties around her ankles and her breath shallow and sticking in her throat. She kicked her underwear off her foot and over toward the tub, not wanting to look at it any longer. The color made her cringe. She took another minute to get her breathing regulated and then shouted at the top of her lungs.

“Mom!”

The shout pinged around the tile bathroom, echoing harshly against her own ears and making her wince. The few seconds she spent waiting for a response felt like hours.

“What’s up, kiddo?”

Clarke groaned at the sound of her dad’s voice, muffled through the door.

“I need Mom,” she said, bending over and pressing her forehead to her naked knees.

“Mom’s about to leave for work,” Jake called. “You need toilet paper?”

“No.” Clarke winced as she felt a hot pain spread through her lower abdomen like water. Trickling in slow. But then it hardened and curled in on itself, and Clarke’s face grew hot. Too hot. She felt flushed and nauseated. “I think something’s wrong.”

“What do you mean?”

“I ….” She wasn’t sure how to explain it, so she stuck with being as simple as possible. “My stomach hurts and there’s stuff coming out of my vagina.”

“Oh,” Jake said. “Um.” He cleared his throat. “Okay. Hold on, kiddo. I’ll get your mom.”

A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door.

“Clarke?”

“Come in,” Clarke called, and Abby slipped inside a moment later.

“What’s wrong?”

“It hurts,” Clarke said, one arm curled around her abdomen. She lifted her head and nodded toward her discarded panties. “There’s weird crap coming out of me.”

Abby walked over and squatted by the toilet, one hand settling on Clarke’s naked knee and the other reaching for the tossed underwear. After a quick look, she squeezed Clarke’s knee and said, “Oh honey, you’ve got your period.”

“But it’s brown,” Clarke said, shaking her head. “I thought it was supposed to be red. You know, like blood.”

Standing, Abby crossed to the sink. “It’s like that sometimes.” She wetted a wash cloth and then pressed the cold material to Clarke’s cheeks. “You’re overheated.”

Clarke felt the tension start to leak out and away. Her shoulders caved and her heart began to slow and steady. “I maybe panicked a little.”

“That’s okay,” Abby said, patting Clarke’s thigh with her free hand. “I’m going to get you some wet wipes and a clean pair of panties. I’ll send your dad to the store for some tampons and pads, and we can talk about which you want to try first. Okay?”

“Okay.”

Abby stood and kissed the top of Clarke’s head. “I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.” Clarke let out a slow, steadying breath, blowing the cool air up toward her burning cheeks. A quiet groan escaped as she pressed her forehead to her knees again and closed her eyes. What a way to kick off the school year. Puberty had been stringing her along for nearly two years, and her uterus just happened to choose this day of all days to catch up. Talk about luck.

At least, Clarke thought, it couldn’t get any worse.

* * *

“She’s here.”

The hand suddenly slamming into the locker next to hers startled Clarke. She jumped and blinked down hard, trying to adjust to the sudden rush of features swimming in front of her face. Dark hair. Dark, wide eyes. Rapidly moving lips. Ridiculous hat flipped around backward and begging to be confiscated.

“Um, happy sophomore year to you, too, Octavia,” Clarke said. “Since when are you so awake at 8 AM?” She let out a quiet laugh and went back to stuffing her new notebooks in her locker.

“ _Hello?_ Clarke?” Octavia grabbed Clarke by the backpack still partially slung over her arm and yanked her out of her locker. She then slammed the door closed and looked at Clarke expectantly. “Did you not hear what I just said?”

Clarke’s brow furrowed. She glanced down to Octavia’s hand, still curled around the strap of her backpack, and then back up again. “Not really. I’m a little distracted by the natural disaster taking place in my uterus right now.”

Octavia blinked as though Clarke had just shaken her out of a trance. “You finally got your period?”

“Yeah, and we’re already not friends,” Clarke said. “It was all brown and thick at first. I completely freaked for a minute.”

Octavia nodded. “Yeah, just wait ’til you’re passing huge blobs of tissue and having panic attacks thinking you’re pregnant every time your period is, like, two minutes late even though you’re a virgin.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Clarke said, laughing.

“I know, but trust me,” Octavia said. She shrugged and the movement jostled Clarke’s arm. She glanced down to see Octavia’s fingers still wrapped around the strap.

“Just so you know,” Clarke said, pointing to the strap, “that’s not a leash. You can’t drag me around by it.”

Octavia blinked again and looked down at her hand. Her eyes widened. “Oh my god,” she said. “You distracted me.” She glanced over Clarke’s shoulder and then looked back at Clarke. “I was trying to tell you that she’s _here_ , Clarke.”

“Who?” Clarke glanced briefly around but didn’t notice anything or anyone out of the ordinary. “ _Who’s_ here?”

Octavia used her hold on Clarke’s backpack to swing her around. She pulled Clarke’s back to her chest and pointed over her shoulder toward the end of the hall. Clarke followed her direction to the main office, and at first, she didn’t see much of anything. Just a few students standing around inside, their backs to the large glass windows, and Principal Kane jabbering on at them. But then Kane pointed toward the windows and the three students grouped in front of him turned and looked. That one look was enough to suck the oxygen out of the hallway, and suddenly, Clarke couldn’t breathe.

Her chest immediately seized up, lungs burning. Her throat constricted as rapidly as her stomach plummeted to her feet, and the hallway spun and spun around her.

There, in the middle of the three, was a face she would recognize anywhere. High cheekbones and tired, light eyes, framed by a mane of long, bushy brown hair. Those features had haunted her dreams for months, since a chance encounter at the county fair.

Octavia’s words rang in Clarke’s ears. _She’s here_.

She.

_Lexa._

Lexa was back.

* * *

Clarke’s immediate instinct was to make contact. Every hallway seemed empty, every classroom, the size of a shoebox, and all that remained was she and Lexa stretched across a gaping, abandoned bridge or pressed inside a shrinking space. They had made eye contact in that first moment, when reality swept Clarke up again and air spilled back into her lungs. Lexa had stepped out of the office and glanced down the hallway, and for just a brief moment, they connected. One look. That one look somehow felt like a lifetime, something fleeting and fragile and counting down, something to inspire action, but Clarke knew she couldn’t cave to her instinct.

She couldn’t go to Lexa, couldn’t spark up a conversation or push her to reconnect, to understand, to forgive. To open up and tell Clarke everything about where she had been, all the sights she had seen, who she had met and connected with and _loved_. She couldn’t ask Lexa who she was now, who she had become, chiseled out of experiences Clarke could only imagine because she didn’t _know_. She and Lexa, there was nothing but space between them, space and time and untold stories.

They had grown up together in pieces, scattered here and there, like an unfinished puzzle. In moments, sometimes tender and sometimes turbulent. In both careful and careless connection. They collided as two roads converging, two paths always intended to meet, only to diverge again. Everything they had ever been to one another, their entire fractured history, was but a blip in time, so miniscule in scale that one could blink and miss it. Their first words, their first touch, their first embrace. Their first secret and how it ached, how it echoed, how it lasted. Their first goodbye, its voice stolen, and then their second, their third, and all the hellos in-between.

But even a blip, Clarke knew, could alter a life, or two lives. Hers and Lexa’s. Their blip had been enough to alter Clarke at six years old, then again at nine, at ten, at fourteen. And now, on the cusp of sixteen, she was yet again shaken. She was breathless. It was enough to make her yearn for contact, and it was enough to restrain her. It sat like a hiccup in her chest, a hard, fast ache playing on continual loop and keeping her frozen, keeping them apart.

So, Clarke watched from a distance, mapping Lexa’s features from three rows over, across a packed cafeteria or a yawning hallway. She studied her, absorbing every detail of the young woman forged from the quiet fire of an affection-starved girl, a girl Clarke still held so firmly in her heart. A girl she still dreamed of, still pressed into paper with charcoal and color, still mourned. Still loved.

And in the evenings, she went back to her treehouse, long left lonely, and she sat on the old mattress and sketched. New, harder angles. Older eyes. Long, lanky limbs. Each new piece she tacked to the old walls created a story, and Clarke sighed as she lay back and followed along, watching Lexa Woods grow up in black and white.

She wasn’t happy with the situation, with staying away and keeping quiet. Clarke had always been drawn to fix and heal things. The thought of letting something broken simply lie ate away at her, because she and Lexa, they didn’t have to be broken. They didn’t have to be this way, torn apart and timid and always wondering about the other. But that’s what they were, and that’s what they would continue to be, because Clarke couldn’t bring herself to take that step. She’d taken so many steps before that had only led to their being separated time and again, so many steps that had only ever turned Lexa cold and distant.

She couldn’t push, couldn’t make demands. Lexa had been subject to that too many times in her life and by too many people. Clarke didn’t want to be a part of that. So, she decided to wait. She would wait for a signal, a sign, a window of opportunity, wait for Lexa to need her again or want her or love her like she used to.

She tried not to think about the possibility that such a sign might never come, that she was the only one paying attention. Perhaps Lexa never wondered about her at all.

* * *

Clarke lay her head on her desk, pressing her hot cheek against the cool surface. She felt overheated, flushed from head to toe, and pain crawled like an angry insect through her abdomen. Her uterus crunched in on itself until Clarke thought she would pass out. She was on the third day of her period, the third day of the school year, the third day of avoiding the one person she was desperate to talk to, and it wasn’t going so hot. Or it was going _too_ hot, much too hot.

The chair squeaked as Clarke pushed it back and stood shakily to her feet. “Miss Pa…” She fanned at her face and closed her eyes, the name slipping away from her. The room spun and spun around her.

Miss Palmer turned and frowned. “Clarke? What’s wrong?”

“I need to go—”

She could barely get the words out, but as soon as what little she _could_ manage made it across her lips, she stumbled her way out of the classroom and down the hall to the nearest bathroom. The first stall was empty, and Clarke slipped inside. She barely got her pants down before dropping onto the toilet, and then she wrapped an arm around her aching abdomen and bent over, pressing her heated face down between her knees. Sharp breaths in and out soothed her, air puffing down toward the floor with each exhale.

When the wave of dizziness finally passed, she reached between her legs and slowly pulled out her tampon. She dropped it by its string into the water, and her fingers came away coated in red. She had bled right through the damned thing after only a couple of hours. She glanced down and realized that her underwear was in much the same shape as her hand. A deep red stain covered the material, the blood having soaked completely through, and Clarke groaned when she pushed her panties aside to see the same stain on the inside of her jeans. She closed her eyes again and leaned over against the stall wall, exhausted. Tears burned under her eyelids, and Clarke took deep breaths to try to keep her anxiety at bay.

The sound of the bathroom door opening startled her, but Clarke didn’t move. She stayed where she was, eyes closed and mind focused on her breathing. But then…

“Clarke?”

The stall wall rattled a bit as Clarke pushed off of it, sitting up on the toilet. She was fully alert now. Her breath came faster, and she tried to keep it calm, keep _herself_ calm, but that familiar voice was like a door swinging open inside her head. Suddenly, there was too much history spilling in.

She licked her lips, and her own voice escaped in a tired croak. “Lexa?”

Clarke closed her eyes again at the sound of her own voice, at the name slipping over her lips. She had wanted to say it, out loud, since the moment their eyes locked in the hallway, but she had kept it to herself. She had kept everything to herself. It felt good to say it, to say it in a way that acknowledged their familiarity. Lexa was a person she knew, even if only in little pockets of time and memory. So much had changed, like the way Lexa said her name and the way she carried herself, the way Clarke felt when she looked at her, like more of an adult than a teenager. It baffled and thrilled her and tore her apart from the inside. So much had changed, was still changing, _would_ change, but Clarke knew her. She knew her. They knew each other.

“Miss Palmer sent me to check on you,” Lexa said. Her shuffling steps echoed in the empty bathroom. A moment later, two dirty, holey Converse shoes appeared under the door of Clarke’s stall.

Clarke licked her lips again. They suddenly felt too dry, the same as her throat. Every swallow was scratchy and slow. “Why you?”

“I was closest to the door,” came the reply, and Lexa was so close now. Her lullaby voice drifted in from the other side of the door, and Clarke was surprised by how easily it still managed to soothe her. Even altered, even older, it was still Lexa. It was still her Lexa.

“Oh.”

“Are you okay?”

“I….” Clarke didn’t want to admit just how _not_ okay she was, but at the same time, she didn’t want Lexa to leave. It was ridiculous, but Clarke needed this. She needed a moment with her, any moment, no matter how mortifying. “No.”

“Oh.” Lexa shuffled in place, her feet visibly shifting in her shoes. “Should I get the teacher?”

“No,” Clarke said quickly. “No, I just...I don’t feel good. I bled through my tampon.”

“Oh.”

There was a lot of that going on. A lot of _oh_ to fill up the silence, to drink up the space. An _oh_ for every year they’d been part, for every bit of uncomfortable that had infiltrated their once dependable ease. There wasn’t enough _oh_ , though, Clarke knew. Not enough to eat up the hurt.

“I have another,” Clarke said. “I just….”

She pulled the new tampon from her pocket and unwrapped it, snapped out the applicator stick, and then cleaned herself up before inserting it. She tried to wipe up the blood in her panties and on the insides of her thighs, but too much of it had already dried. The damage was done.

“I need new clothes.”

“Did you bring any?” Lexa asked, still hovering outside the stall. God, this was awkward, but Clarke couldn’t bring herself to care, because Lexa was there and she was talking. She wasn’t walking away. “I could go to your locker and g—”

“No,” Clarke said, taking a deep breath before standing and flushing. She pulled up her stained underwear and pants and tried not to cringe at the damp, sticky spots pressing against her skin.  “I don’t have any.”

It took Clarke a moment to psych herself up but then she opened the stall door and came face to face with one of the most painful, precious parts of her past. Lexa stood in front of her, spine stiff as a board and full bottom lip tucked under her top teeth.

“Clarke,” she said, meeting Clarke’s eyes, and Clarke felt a stab of pain at the sound of her name on Lexa’s tongue again. Something so familiar yet so foreign. So different yet still the same. It was strange and wonderful, and Clarke suddenly felt overwhelmed with the urge to cry.

“Lexa,” she breathed, a little timid, a little breathless. She expected it to be over then, for Lexa to see that she was fine and turn swiftly on her well-worn heel. Leave the bathroom with little more than a shrug of her shoulder or a nod of her head. Instead, Lexa stayed put, her baggy jeans making scratching sounds as she shifted on her feet again. Her hair was pulled back in a low ponytail, and her eyes were hidden behind a pair of round, wire-rimmed glasses that she pushed up with her index finger. The sight made Clarke just a little more tender.

She imagined Lexa small again, all baggy t-shirts and one-word replies and timid touches that, as a child, always made Clarke feel like she had just climbed to the top of the world and planted a flag. It was in that moment she realized Lexa wasn’t so different now. She was the same girl, a little less timid, a little less quiet, but still reserved. Still swallowed up by too-big clothing. Still looking at Clarke, always looking at her.

“What do you need?”

Clarke was surprised by the question, surprised that Lexa was still standing in front of her; surprised by the words that jumped from her own lips in reply. “I need to get out of here.”

One of Lexa’s bushy eyebrows spiked toward her hairline, and Clarke let out a long sigh.

“I need to change my clothes,” she said, then deflated. Her eyes began to sting and water. She didn’t have a clue why, but she couldn’t stop it. The tears built up faster than she could blink them away, and her voice cracked when she spoke. “But mostly, I just want to go home.”

Lexa looked at her for one long, silent moment, then she surprised Clarke again by nodding. One firm dip of her head, and then, she left.

It was almost as if she’d never come, just like at the fair. Clarke blinked and she was alone. Tears came even faster, spilling over her lashes and sliding down her cheeks, and Clarke suddenly had the urge to crumple to the floor and curl into a ball. Disappear. Instead, she let out a heavy breath, wiped her cheeks, then washed her hands. How was she going to go back to class like this? She didn’t have a change of clothes, nothing to cover up with, and she was a mess. She was flushed and embarrassed and still hurting.

The bathroom door opened again, and Clarke jumped. A part of her hadn’t actually expected Lexa to return, but there she was, hovering just inside the door with her textbooks and Clarke’s.

“What did you tell Miss Palmer?” Clarke asked, and Lexa shrugged a shoulder.

“That I was taking you to the nurse.” She crossed to the sink and handed Clarke her things.

A small smile pulled at Clarke’s lips, a nervous smile. Something just as terrified and excited as her heart right now. “Where are you actually taking me?”

“Home,” Lexa said, and Clarke gawked at her.

“You want to ditch?”

Lexa’s brow furrowed. “You said you wanted to go home.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Which door is the easiest to escape from?” Lexa asked, and Clarke’s head spun a bit. They were actually going to do this.

One minute, they were avoiding each other. Not talking. Pretending like they didn’t have a hell of a lot of history humming in the air between them. The next, they were plotting their grand escape from inside a high-school bathroom as if they were never separated, never broken, never anything but Clarke and Lexa.

Clarke walked around Lexa to the door and poked her head out.

“Wait,” Lexa said, and Clarke slinked back inside. She turned to look at her and caught Lexa’s gaze just as it was darting up from Clarke’s backside. Clarke felt her cheeks flush as Lexa cleared her throat and put down her textbooks just long enough to remove the red flannel button-up she was wearing over her t-shirt. She held it out to Clarke and cleared her throat again. “You should wear it around your waist.”

“O-Oh,” Clarke stuttered, face growing hotter. The heat spread over her ears and down her neck. The blood stain. Of course. She tried not to feel embarrassed, but the feeling came anyway. All the ways she had imagined reconnecting with Lexa, and _this_ was the crap scenario fate decided to stick her with? Come _on_. Clarke took Lexa’s shirt and knotted the sleeves around her waist so that the rest of the shirt hung down over her butt, hiding the stain. “Thank you.”

They stared at one another for a long moment, silent and uneasy, before Clarke stuck her head back out into the empty hallway. “It’s still clear,” she said. “Fourth period won’t be up for another half-hour or so.”

“Which exit?”

Clarke thought on that for a moment. “The door by the art room is our best bet. It leads out to the gym, so if anyone sees us, they’ll just think we’re going to another class. We can cut through the elementary playground and then over to Bowman Street. We should be clear after that.”

“Do you need to get anything from your locker first?”

“No, I’m good,” Clarke said. “Do you?”

Lexa shook her head, then followed Clarke out into the hallway. They hesitated, standing just outside the bathroom like two people who had somehow gotten mixed up and turned around and didn’t know where they were anymore.

“You sure you want to do this?” Clarke asked. When Lexa only nodded in answer, Clarke grinned. She was still overwhelmed, still a little dizzy, but now Clarke wasn’t sure how much of it was due to her period and how much of it was due to Lexa. “All right. Follow me then.”

“Okay, Clarke.”

The words hit Clarke like a heavy wave, crashing over her and making her stumble over her own feet. Making her heart thump hard and loud. Making her mouth dry. She could practically hear the old echo rocking between her ears.

_Okay, Clawke._

She turned just enough to look at Lexa, just enough to remind herself, then she swallowed down the past and turned back, leading Lexa toward the south side of the building. Toward the art room. Toward escape.

* * *

The walk to Clarke’s house was silent to the point of making her skin crawl. There were so many things she wanted to say, so many things swirling around inside her head. A million different versions of _I’m sorry_ and _I’ve missed you_ and _Let’s start over_ bounced between her ears. But nothing would come out. Every word stuck to Clarke’s tongue and wouldn’t move, bobbed at the back of her throat like a pill that wouldn’t go down. She spent the entire walk always on the verge of speaking and always _not_. It was maddening.

Lexa, unsurprisingly, seemed content in the quiet. She walked alongside Clarke, not close but not far either, with her hands fixed loosely behind her back and her eyes focused on the road. Their elbows didn’t brush. Their hips didn’t bump. They didn’t touch once, and Clarke was very aware of that fact. Lexa seemed to be as well, if the subtle glances she shot Clarke’s way every few steps were anything to go by.

The closer they drew to Clarke’s house, the more her mind began to race, questions buzzing around her head that she dared not put to voice. She wondered why Lexa hadn’t ditched her as soon as they were off school grounds. They hadn’t seen each other in a year and the last time they _had_ , Lexa hadn’t seemed to want to be around Clarke at all. So, why now? Why hadn’t she scattered to the wind as soon as the opportunity presented itself? The thought led Clarke to wonder where Lexa lived now and who she lived _with_ , maybe that girl who had been with Raven at the fair. Anya, Clarke thought her name was. She wondered if Lexa lived nearby or if she would need to catch a bus to make it home. _If_ she wanted to go home at all. Why was Lexa back at their school? Had she found a good family? Was someone there to ask her about her day when she got home? Was someone helping her with her homework and making her dinner every night? Did she have a boyfriend, a girlfriend, a _friend_? Was someone loving her?

“Clarke?”

Clarke blinked and looked up. At some point, they had stopped walking. Lexa now stood directly in front of her and was looking at her with a curious expression, one brow raised. “Huh?”

“This is your house, isn’t it?”

Clarke turned. Sure enough, there was her house, just one short driveway and a freshly mown lawn away.  “Oh,” she said. “I…yup, that’s me.” She looked back to Lexa. “You remembered?”

The drop of Lexa’s chin surprised her, the way Lexa turned to avoid her gaze. She glanced away, at the ground, up at the sky, then finally back at Clarke. Her answer was little more than a shrug, and it only made Clarke’s head swim with more questions. More questions she bit back and swallowed down because she was terrified of screwing up whatever was happening between them. This shaky reunion, this shy sort of peace, this tentative _something_.

They stood awkwardly at the edge of the driveway for a moment before Clarke cleared her throat and tilted her head toward the house. “You want to come in for a bit?” When Lexa only continued to stare at her, still curious, still a bit shy, Clarke shifted on her feet and said, “My parents won’t be home for a few more hours.”

Her stomach flipped as soon as the words were out, and Clarke didn’t have a clue why. For some reason, she couldn’t hold still in Lexa’s presence, and the thought of being alone with her in her house, in her _bedroom_ , made Clarke almost dizzy. It was a crazy sensation, like her system had malfunctioned somewhere between the kindergarten playground and her own empty driveway. Little fires sparked to life in her cells, and her face felt hot. She blew a bit of air up toward her cheeks and wondered if she was having another hormone-fueled hot flash.

She knew by the way it felt that her face had to be beet red, and Clarke could have sworn she saw Lexa’s lips quirk at the corner, just the tiniest bit, but when she blinked, it was gone. She wondered if it had ever actually been there at all, and if it had, should she be embarrassed or excited? Her body didn’t seem too keen on choosing between the two and settled on both. Her heart thumped hard against her ribs. Why she still cared so much what Lexa thought of her, why she still so desperately wanted Lexa to _want_ to be near her, was beyond her. She couldn’t make sense of it, and she didn’t care to try. In that moment, all she cared about was the flicker of conflict in Lexa’s green eyes and how it deepened briefly before it cleared. Worry spilled through Clarke’s gut, but then the conflict cleared as quickly as it came, and Lexa gave her a gentle nod.

They made their way up the short driveway to the door, Lexa following silently along behind her, and Clarke suddenly realized that she didn’t have her keys. They were in her backpack in her locker, and she hadn’t gone back to get them. She double-checked her pockets to be sure but found only her phone.

“Shit.” She turned toward Lexa whose eyes were conflicted again and said, “I forgot my keys at school.”

“Oh.”

“Come on,” Clarke said, tipping her head to the side. “There’s a spare key around back. We can go in through the patio door.”

She led Lexa around the house and into the large backyard, the massive oak tree filling up most of its green space and cradling Clarke’s beloved treehouse. Clarke glanced back to see Lexa looking it over.

“My dad and I built it,” she said, and Lexa looked at her, surprised. “It used to be like my little home away from home.”

“It’s in your backyard, Clarke.”

Clarke laughed and nodded. “Okay, so my home _slightly_ away from home,” she said, picking up a flower pot on the patio and snatching up the key taped to the bottom. “But it’s got everything a girl could want or need. A bed, a lamp, snacks, sketchbooks, even a few video games.” She slotted the key into the back door while Lexa continued to stare at the treehouse.

“Impressive.”

“Thanks.” Clarke opened the door and stepped just inside the frame. She leaned against one side and waved for Lexa to enter ahead of her. Lexa, however, didn’t follow Clarke’s cue. Instead, she leaned against the other side of the frame, back a little rigid, and continued to stare out into the backyard.

Clarke’s heart rate kicked up again at Lexa’s hesitation. She wanted to urge her inside, but she had learned over the years not to push Lexa. She was like a caged animal, a precious wild thing with the wild beaten out of her. She had to come in her own way, in her own time, and she couldn’t be rushed. She had to choose you, and Clarke had been lining up to be chosen since she was six years old. She wondered if the impulse to do so would ever stop.

So, Clarke let it be what it was. She leaned against the frame opposite Lexa and looked her over as Lexa looked over the yard. She took in every detail as they stood together in comfortable silence, every bit familiar and every bit new. A frizzy strand of hair hung around Lexa’s face, having escaped from her loose ponytail, and in the gentle quiet, Clarke didn’t think. She just reacted. She reached toward Lexa, intent on tucking the wild strand behind Lexa’s ear. Lexa turned just as Clarke’s hand neared her face, and their eyes locked. Clarke suddenly became conscious of what she was doing. She yanked her hand back before she could touch and smoothed it down her own shirt instead. She fixed her eyes on the ground and swallowed thickly. “Sorry.”

When there was nothing but silence, Clarke looked up and found Lexa watching her. Her gaze was soft, like that of an old friend or maybe something more, something newer, something Clarke couldn’t put a name to but melted at the sight of. She cleared her throat, dropped her voice to a whisper, and said, “I’m glad you’re here, Lexa.”

That time, she was sure. Lexa’s lips _had_ quirked at the corner, a breath of a smile that lasted only seconds before it disappeared again, but it _had_ been there. But then Lexa’s gaze turned, that same shadow of conflict from earlier once again clouding her eyes, and before Clarke could ask, Lexa shifted off the door frame and stepped away from her.

Clarke’s brow furrowed as Lexa walked off the patio and out into the yard. “Where are you going?”

“I hope you feel better, Clarke,” Lexa said, voice tinged with something thick like sorrow or history. Then she was gone, disappearing around the side of the house.

Clarke felt like someone had punched a hole through her chest. She stared at the place where Lexa had been only moments before, breath trapped somewhere just outside her reach, and tried to blink away the stinging sensation in her eyes. She waited a moment to see if Lexa would come back, if she would pop back around the corner and smile and follow Clarke inside, but she knew she wouldn’t. Like always, Lexa was gone.

With a heavy sigh, Clarke made her way inside and closed the door behind her. She shuffled off to her room and dropped her textbooks on her bed. She could still feel the sticky stain in her panties, uncomfortable and pressing against her thighs with each step, so she began to undress. Her hands went to the top of her jeans, fingers finding soft flannel. She looked down and saw Lexa’s shirt still tied around her waist.

Well, that would at least give her a reason to talk to Lexa again. She unknotted the sleeves and ran her hands over the shirt before bringing it up to her nose. When she breathed in, she didn’t recognize anything about the scents she found on the material. As much as Lexa was still Lexa, she was also someone new, someone older, someone different, and Clarke didn’t know how she smelled, but the shirt could teach her.

It smelled a little like wood smoke and a little like cologne, something older and masculine. It intrigued her. Clarke breathed in the shirt again before letting it fall on top of her pillow. She didn’t put much thought into why she wanted it there, into whether or not she would smell it again later or why she would care to in the first place. She didn’t want to think about it at all, because the more she thought about Lexa, the more she spiraled, and Clarke was just too tired to have another crisis.

She thought about it anyway. As she stripped out of her stained clothes, she thought about the way Lexa smelled. The way she smiled, like she was unwilling to give anything away, any secret or any sacred little part of her. The way she somehow managed to give so much of herself anyway, so much and yet nothing at all at the same time, every time. She’d been that way for as long as Clarke had known her, and it was frustrating. It was thrilling.

Clarke pictured Lexa in her mind, her conflicted eyes and her sharp angles. The hair hanging in her face, and the way Clarke had reached to tuck it away without thought, and in that moment, Clarke realized something. Something that seemed to knock the world right out from beneath her feet.

Lexa hadn’t flinched when Clarke reached for her. She hadn’t winced or objected, and she wasn’t the one who jerked away.

Clarke was.

* * *

The last thing Clarke expected when she walked up to Lexa in the hall, nerves humming like power lines and a freshly washed flannel shirt folded over her arm, was for Lexa to take the shirt with nothing more than a silent nod and walk away.

Clarke stood by Lexa’s locker, gaping, and watched as Lexa disappeared down the hall. The few pitiful attempts at conversation she had worked up the nerve to try still sat uncomfortably on her tongue, choking her. She’d thought, maybe, that the previous day’s events had been some sort of sign. Sure, she’d gotten a stern lecture from her mom about ditching, and her dad had eaten the last bit of peach cobbler right in front of her without even offering her a bite because he knew Clarke considered that a worse punishment than being grounded, but at least she had made progress with Lexa. A door had been opened, or so she’d believed.

Lexa’s back disappearing in the bustle of student bodies, however, was like having that same door slammed right back in her face again. She knocked, jiggled the knob, but it was closed. Sealed. Locked.

She was shut out again, and that single realization was like a stone dropping down Clarke’s throat, knocking against her insides, bruising, battering, and then sinking to the bottom of her stomach.

* * *

Clarke couldn’t sleep again. She lay in bed staring up at her bedroom ceiling and wondering when this feeling would go away, this emptiness in her chest. It ached as if it hadn't always been there, the raw soreness of a fresh, open wound, as if someone had punched a hole through her ribcage and nothing and no one had been able to patch it. It had always been a struggle, each time she’d had to adjust to Lexa leaving, Lexa being gone, Lexa possibly never coming back; but this, it was different. It was harder. Clarke didn’t know how to adjust to Lexa being in her life again but always out of reach. She felt like she was in fourth grade again, desperately trying to get Lexa’s attention, trying to understand what she had done wrong, trying to reconnect, only to be met with a solid, brick wall. With silence. With nothing.

It was the worst kind of feeling.

Two weeks had passed in a crawl, a shaky four-legged display of discomfort, and Clarke had gone back to watching Lexa from a distance. Octavia had tried to encourage her, tried to tell her that it would probably just take time and that they’d figure out a way to fix things, but the reassurances never sank beneath the surface. She was surprised to find herself leaning more toward Jasper’s outlook on things.

“That girl is just weird,” he’d said, and instead of clocking him or showing him to the nearest mirror, Clarke had just nodded.

Lexa _was_ weird. But then, so was Clarke. They were weird when it came to one another. None of Clarke’s friends understood their history or their strange, silent relationship, and Clarke couldn’t even explain it to them because _she_ didn’t understand it either. How was she supposed to make sense of a bunch of fleeting glances, strange gurgling sensations in her stomach, and awkward almost-conversations? And Lexa certainly wasn’t helping. She seemed just as confused as Clarke—always nearby but never any closer; always looking but never engaging; always caught somewhere between a confused frown and the hint of a smile.

Were they going to be friends, or just weirdos who liked to stare at one another from across the cafeteria every day?

History changed everything, it seemed, altering their interactions, or lack thereof, in little ways. It was a strange sort of horror show. A lot of little wonders dipped in discomfort, riddled with bursts of anxiety, rolled about in inexplicable want, speckled with spots of awkwardness and affection, and writhing around in her gut. Sticking at the back of her throat. Dancing about in front of her eyes like a puppet on a string.

Clarke huffed and rolled onto her side. The clock on her bedside table informed her that it was five in the morning. She groaned. Only an hour and a half before she had to get up to get ready for school, and she’d hardly slept at all. She threw back the covers and padded over to the desk under her large bedroom window. Her sketchpad was wedged under her math book. Clarke pulled it free and grabbed a pencil from the top drawer. If she couldn’t sleep, she may as well do something productive.

Plopping into the chair at her desk, Clarke wiggled around until she was comfortable, then opened her sketchbook. She stared out the window into the backyard for a while, willing inspiration to come. The sky was lightening up with the approaching dawn, turning a soft blue, and the colors had begun spilling back into the world in muted tones. The grass went from a blanket of shadows to a dark sheet of green. The light in the treehouse glowed like a—wait, what? The light in the treehouse?

Clarke stood and leaned over the desk. She stared out at the visible glow in the treehouse window and then blinked. Rubbed her eyes. When she looked again, the light was still on, and Clarke frowned. She hadn’t been in the treehouse in a few days. Had she left the lamp on all this time? She was about to grab a hoodie and go out to turn it off when it suddenly clicked off on its own.

“What the hell?” Clarke muttered under her breath. A moment later, she had no breath at all. It stuck hard in her throat and refused to move as Clarke watched the familiar form of Lexa Woods appear at the bottom of the tree house and slink slowly down the ladder nailed to the trunk. Her messy ponytail and round glasses were unmistakable. She hopped off the last plank and landed in a crouch before straightening again. Her mouth stretched in a yawn and she rubbed at one sleepy eye under her glasses before making her way across Clarke’s backyard, and Clarke could do little more than stare at her as she went.

Lexa was nearly out of sight when she glanced over. Her gaze shot to Clarke’s window and Clarke choked on her own saliva. Something crossed between a squeak, a scream, and a weird sort of gurgle jumped through her lips as she scrambled off her desk, trying to duck out of sight, and toppled onto the floor. A second later, her sketchbook, perched precariously on the edge, slipped off as well and smacked onto the top of her head. Clarke groaned and rubbed her head but didn’t otherwise move. She didn’t know why but she felt like _she_ was the one sneaking around someone else’s property.

A few moments felt like hours, and Clarke half-expected her knees to creak when she slowly rose off the floor and peeked over her desk. A little higher still until she could see out the window again. Her eyes scanned the yard, every inch, every shadow, as if Lexa might spring from the ground like a new bloom any second, but there was nothing. No one. Only the dewy grass, growing greener under the rising sun.

Clarke let out a heavy breath and dropped back into her chair. She wasn’t quite sure what to make of what she had just seen, but in that moment, she wasn’t concerned with the details. The  _whens_ , the _hows_ , the _whys_ …they all scattered on a sigh, and Clarke was left with only the stark outline of _what_. The easy truth. Something that felt as simple as it did significant, as it did special.

Lexa had spent the night in Clarke’s tree house.


End file.
